UC-NRLF 


LIBRARY 

OF   THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA. 
™ 

ClMS 


THOMXvS4- 
CXRLYLE 


FAMOUS  SCOTS   SERIES 

The  following  Volumes  are  now  ready: — 

THOMAS  CARLYLE.    By  HECTOR  C.  MACPHERSON. 

ALLAN  RAMSAY.    By  OLIPHANT  SMEATON. 

HUGH  MILLER.     By  W.  KEITH  LEASK. 

JOHN  KNOX.    By  A.  TAYLOR  INNES. 

ROBERT  BURNS.    By  GABRIEL  SETOUN. 

THE  BALLADISTS.     By  JOHN  GEDDIE. 

RICHARD  CAMERON.    By  Professor  HERKLESS. 

SIR  JAMES  Y.  SIMPSON.    By  EVE  BLANTYRE  SIMPSON. 

THOMAS    CHALMERS.        By    Professor    W.    GARDEN 
BLAIKIE. 

JAMES  BOSWELL.    By  W.  KEITH  LEASK. 
TOBIAS  SMOLLETT.    By  OLIPHANT  SMEATON. 
FLETCHER  OF  SALTOUN.     By  G.  W.  T.  OMOND. 
THE  BLACKWOOD  GROUP.     By  Sir  GEORGE  DOUGLAS. 
NORMAN  MACLEOD.    By  JOHN  WELLWOOD. 
SIR  WALTER  SCOTT.    By  Professor  SAINTSBURY. 
KIRKCALDY  OF  GRANGE.     By  Louis  A.  BARB& 
ROBERT  FERGUSSON.    By  A.  B.  GROSART. 
JAMES  THOMSON.    By  WILLIAM  BAYNE. 
MUNGO  PARK.    By  T.  BANKS  MACLACHLAN. 
DAVID  HUME,    By  Professor  CALDERWOOD. 


THOMAS 
CARLYLE 

BY 

HECTOR  :  C 
MACPHERSON 

FAMOUS 

SCOTS: 

SERIES 


PUBLISHED  BY  QT 
OLIPHANT  ANDERSON 
tfFERRIER'EDlNBVRGH 
AND  LONDON  <Ss,  -c^ 


The  designs  and  ornaments  of  this 
volume  are  by  Mr  Joseph  Brown, 
and  the  printing  from  the  press  of 
Messrs  Turnbull  &  Spears,  Edinburgh. 


Second  Edition  completing  Seventh  Thousand. 


PREFACE  TO   THE   SECOND   EDITION 

OF  the  writing  of  books  on  Carlyle  there  is  no  end. 
Why,  then,  it  may  pertinently  be  asked,  add  another 
stone  to  the  Carlylean  cairn?  The  reply  is  obvious. 
In  a  series  dealing  with  famous  Scotsmen,  Carlyle  has 
a  rightful  claim  to  a  niche  in  the  temple  of  Fame. 
While  prominence  has  been  given  in  the  book  to  the 
Scottish  side  of  Carlyle's  life,  the  fact  has  not  been 
lost  sight  of  that  Carlyle  owed  much  to  Germany; 
indeed,  if  we  could  imagine  the  spirit  of  a  German 
philosopher  inhabiting  the  body  of  a  Covenanter  of 
dyspeptic  and  sceptical  tendencies,  a  good  idea  would 
be  had  of  Thomas  Carlyle.  Needless  to  say,  I 
have  been  largely  indebted  to  the  biography  by  Mr 
Froude,  and  to  Carlyle's  Reminiscences.  After  all  has 
been  said,  the  fact  remains  that  Froude's  portrait, 
though  truthful  in  the  main,  is  somewhat  deficient 
in  light  and  shade — qualities  which  the  student 
will  find  admirably  supplied  in  Professor  Masson's 
charming  little  book,  "Carlyle  Personally,  and  in 
his  Writings."  To  the  Professor  I  am  under  deep 


-  171) 


6  PREFACE 

obligation  for  the  interest  he  has  shown  in  the 
book.  In  the  course  of  his  perusal  of  the  proofs, 
Professor  Masson  made  valuable  corrections  and  sug- 
gestions, which  deserve  more  than  a  formal  acknow- 
ledgment. To  Mr  Haldane,  M.P.,  my  thanks  are 
also  due  for  his  suggestive  criticism  of  the  chapter  on 
German  thought,  upon  which  he  is  an  acknowledged 
authority. 

I  have  also  to  express  my  deep  obligations  to  Mr 
John  Morley,  who,  in  the  midst  of  pressing  engage- 
ments, kindly  found  time  to  read  the  proof  sheets. 
In  a  private  note  Mr  Morley  has  been  good  enough 
to  express  his  general  sympathy  and  concurrence  with 
my  estimate  of  Carlyle. 

EDINBURGH,  October  1897. 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER  I 

VAGE 

EARLY  LIFE         ......  9 


CHAPTER  II 
CRAIGENPUTTOCK — LITERARY  EFFORTS  .  .  29 

CHAPTER  III 
CARLYLE'S  MENTAL  DEVELOPMENT  ...  42 

CHAPTER  IV 
LIFE  IN  LONDON  .  .  .  .65 

CHAPTER  V 
HOLIDAY  JOURNEYINGS— LITERARY  WORK  .  ,  79 

CHAPTER  VI 
RECTORIAL  ADDRESS— DEATH  OF  MRS  CARLYLE  .  112 

CHAPTER  VII 
LAST  YEARS  AND  DEATH  OF  CARLYLE  ,  ,  129 


8  CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  VIII 

PAGE 

CARLYLE  AS  A  SOCIAL  AND  POLITICAL  THINKER       .        138 

CHAPTER  IX 

CARLYLE  AS  AN  INSPIRATIONAL  FORCE  .  .        152 


THOMAS    CARLYLE 

CHAPTER  I 

EARLY    LIFE 

'  A  GREAT  man,'  says  Hegel,  '  condemns  the  world  to 
the  task  of  explaining  him.'  Emphatically  does  the 
remark  apply  to  Thomas  Carlyle.  When  he  began  to 
leave  his  impress  in  literature,  he  was  treated  as  a  con- 
fusing and  inexplicable  element.  Opinion  oscillated 
between  the  view  of  James  Mill,  that  Carlyle  was  an 
insane  rhapsodist,  and  that  of  Jeffrey,  that  he  was 
afflicted  with  a  chronic  craze  for  singularity.  Jeffrey's 
verdict  sums  up  pretty  effectively  the  attitude  of  the 
critics  of  the  time  to  the  new  writer : — '  I  suppose 
that  you  will  treat  me  as  something  worse  than  an  ass, 
when  I  say  that  I  am  firmly  persuaded  the  great  source 
of  your  extravagance,  and  all  that  makes  your  writings 
intolerable  to  many  and  ridiculous  to  not  a  few,  is  not 
so  much  any  real  peculiarity  of  opinion,  as  an  unlucky 
ambition  to  appear  more  original  than  you  are.'  The 
blunder  made  by  Jeffrey  in  regard  both  to  Carlyle  and 


io  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

Wordsworth  emphasises  the  truth  which  critics  seem 
reluctant  to  bear  in  mind,  that,  before  the  great  man 
can  be  explained,  he  must  be  appreciated.  Emphati- 
cally true  of  Carlyle  it  is  that  he  creates  the  standard 
by  which  he  is  judged.  Carlyle  resembles  those 
products  of  the  natural  world  which  biologists  call 
'sports' — products  which,  springing  up  in  a  spon- 
taneous and  apparently  erratic  way,  for  a  time  defy 
classification.  The  time  is  appropriate  for  an  attempt 
to  classify  the  great  thinker,  whose  birth  took  place  one 
hundred  years  ago. 

Towards  the  close  of  the  last  century  a  stone-mason, 
named  James  Carlyle,  started  business  on  his  own 
account  in  the  village  of  Ecclefechan,  Dumfriesshire. 
He  was  an  excellent  tradesman,  and  frugal  withal ;  and 
in  the  year  1791  he  married  a  distant  kinswoman  of 
his  own,  Janet  Carlyle,  who  died  after  giving  birth 
to  a  son.  In  the  beginning  of  1795  ne  married  one 
Margaret  Aitken,  a  worthy,  intelligent  woman  ;  and  on 
the  4th  of  December  following  a  son  was  born,  whom 
they  called  Thomas,  after  his  paternal  grandfather. 
This  child  was  destined  to  be  the  most  original  writer 
of  his  time. 

Little  Thomas  was  early  taught  to  read  by  his 
mother,  and  at  the  age  of  five  he  learnt  to  '  count ' 
from  his  father.  He  was  then  sent  to  the  village  school ; 
and  in  his  seventh  year  he  was  reported  to  be  '  com- 
plete '  in  English.  As  the  schoolmaster  was  weak  in 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  n 

the  classics,  Tom  was  taught  the  rudiments  of  Latin  by 
the  burgher  minister,  of  which  strict  sect  James  Carlyle 
was  a  zealous  member.  One  summer  morning,  in  1806, 
his  father  took  him  to  Annan  Academy.  '  It  was  a 
bright  morning,'  he  wrote  long  years  thereafter,  '  and 
to  me  full  of  moment,  of  fluttering  boundless  Hopes, 
saddened  by  parting  with  Mother,  with  Home,  and 
which  afterwards  were  cruelly  disappointed.'  At  that 
'  doleful  and  hateful  Academy,'  to  use  his  own  words, 
Thomas  Carlyle  spent  three  years,  learning  to  read 
French  and  Latin,  and  the  Greek  alphabet,  as  well  as 
acquiring  a  smattering  of  geometry  and  algebra. 

It  was  in  the  Academy  that  he  got  his  first  glimpse 
of  Edward  Irving — probably  in  April  or  May  1808 — 
who  had  called  to  pay  his  respects  to  his  old  teacher, 
Mr  Hope.  Thomas's  impression  of  him  was  that  of 
a  'flourishing  slip  of  a  youth,  with  coal-black  hair, 
swarthy  clear  complexion,  very  straight  on  his  feet, 
and  except  for  the  glaring  squint  alone,  decidedly 
handsome.'  Years  passed  before  young  Carlyle  saw 
Irving's  face  again. 

James  Carlyle,  although  an  austere  man,  and  the 
reverse  of  demonstrative,  was  bound  up  in  his  son, 
sparing  no  expense  upon  the  youth's  education.  On 
one  occasion  he  exclaimed,  with  an  unwonted  outburst 
of  glee,  *  Tom,  I  do  not  grudge  thy  schooling,  now 
when  thy  Uncle  Frank  owns  thee  to  be  a  better  Arith- 
metician than  himself.'  Early  recognising  the  natural 


12  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

talent  and  aptitude  of  his  son,  he  determined  to  send  him 
to  the  nearest  university,  with  a  view  to  Thomas  studying 
for  the  ministry.  One  crisp  winter's  morning,  in  1809, 
found  Thomas  Carlyle  on  his  way  to  Edinburgh,  trudg 
ing  the  entire  distance — one  hundred  miles  or  so. 

He  went  through  the  usual  university  course, 
attended  the  divinity  classes,  and  delivered  the  cus- 
tomary discourses  in  English  and  Latin.  But  Tom  was 
not  destined  to  '  wag  his  head  in  a  pulpit,'  for  he  had 
conscientious  objections  which  parental  control  in  no 
way  interfered  with.  Referring  to  this  vital  period  of 
his  life,  Carlyle  wrote :  '  His  [father's]  tolerance  for 
me,  his  trust  in  me,  was  great.  When  I  declined 
going  forward  into  the  Church  (though  his  heart  was 
set  upon  it),  he  respected  my  scruples,  my  volition, 
and  patiently  let  me  have  my  way.'  Carlyle  never 
looked  back  to  his  university  life  with  satisfaction. 
In  his  interesting  recollections  Mr  Moncure  Conway 
represents  Carlyle,  describing  his  experiences  as  follows : 
— '  Very  little  help  did  I  get  from  anybody  in  those 
years,  and,  as  I  may  say,  no  sympathy  at  all  in  all  this 
old  town.  And  if  there  was  any  difference,  it  was  found 
least  where  I  might  most  have  hoped  for  it.  There 

was  Professor .     For  years  I  attended  his  lectures, 

in  all  weathers  and  all  hours.  Many  and  many  a  time, 
when  the  class  was  called  together,  it  was  fo,und  to 
consist  of  one  individual — to  wit,  of  him  now  speak- 
ing; and  still  oftener,  when  others  were  present,  the 


THOMAS  C ARLYLE  1 3 

only  person  who  had  at  all  looked  into  the  lesson 
assigned  was  the  same  humble  individual.  I  remember 
no  instance  in  which  these  facts  elicited  any  note  or 
comment  from  that  instructor.  He  once  requested 
me  to  translate  a  mathematical  paper,  and  I  worked 
through  it  the  whole  of  one  Sunday,  and  it  was  laid 
before  him,  and  it  was  received  without  remark  or 
thanks.  After  such  long  years,  I  came  to  part  with 
him,  and  to  get  my  certificate.  Without  a  word,  he 
wrote  on  a  bit  of  paper :  "  I  certify  that  Mr  Thomas 
Carlyle  has  been  in  my  class  during  his  college  course, 
and  has  made  good  progress  in  his  studies."  Then  he 
rang  a  bell,  and  ordered  a  servant  to  open  the  front 
door  for  me.  Not  the  slightest  sign  that  I  was  a 
person  whom  he  could  have  distinguished  in  any 

crowd.     And  so  I  parted  from  old  .' 

Professor  Masson,  who  in  loving,  painstaking  style 
has  ferreted  all  the  facts  about  Carlyle's  university  life, 
sums  up  in  these  words :  '  Without  assuming  that  he 
meant  the  university  described  in  Sartor  Resartus  to 
stand  literally  for  Edinburgh  University,  of  his  own 
experience,  we  have  seen  enough  to  show  that  any 
specific  training  of  much  value  he  considered  himself 
to  owe  to  his  four  years  in  the  Arts  classes  in  Edin- 
burgh University,  was  the  culture  of  his  mathematical 
faculty  under  Leslie,  and  that  for  the  rest  he  acknow- 
ledged merely  a  certain  benefit  from  being  in  so  many 
class-rooms  where  matters  intellectual  were  professedly 


i4  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

in  the  atmosphere,  and  where  he  learned  to  take  advan- 
tage of  books.'  As  Carlyle  put  it  in  his  Rectorial 
Address  of  1866,  'What  I  have  found  the  university 
did  for  me  is  that  it  taught  me  to  read  in  various 
languages,  in  various  sciences,  so  that  I  go  into  the 
books  which  treated  of  these  things,  and  gradually 
penetrate  into  any  department  I  wanted  to  make 
myself  master  of,  as  I  found  it  suit  me.' 

In  1814,  Carlyle  obtained  the  mathematical  tutor- 
ship at  Annan.  Out  of  his  slender  salary  of  £6a  or 
^70  he  was  able  to  save  something,  so  that  he  was 
practically  independent.  By  and  by  James  Carlyle  gave 
up  his  trade,  and  settled  on  a  small  farm  at  Mainhill, 
about  two  miles  from  Ecclefechan.  Thither  Thomas 
hied  with  unfeigned  delight  at  holiday  time,  for  he 
led  the  life  of  a  recluse  at  Annan,  his  books  being  his 
sole  companions. 

Edward  Irving,  to  whom  Carlyle  was  introduced  in 
college  days,  was  now  settled  as  a  dominie  in  Kirk- 
caldy.  His  teaching  was  not  favourably  viewed  by 
some  of  the  parents,  who  started  a  rival  school,  and 
resolved  to  import  a  second  master,  with  the  result 
that  Carlyle  was  selected.  Irving,  with  great  mag- 
nanimity, gave  him  a  cordial  welcome  to  the  c  Lang 
Toon,'  and  the  two  Annandale  natives  became  fast 
friends.  The  elder  placed  his  well-selected  library  at 
the  disposal  of  the  younger,  and  together  they  explored 
the  whole  countryside.  Short  visits  to  Edinburgh  had 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  15 

a  special  attraction  for  both,  where  they  met  with  a 
few  kindred  spirits.  On  one  of  those  visits,  Carlyle, 
who  had  not  cut  off  his  connection  with  the  university, 
called  at  the  Divinity  Hall  to  put  down  his  name 
formally  on  the  annual  register.  In  his  own  words : 
'  Old  Dr  Ritchie  "  not  at  home  "  when  I  called  to  enter 
myself.  "  Good  !  "  answered  I ;  "  let  the  omen  be  ful- 
filled" '  Carlyle's  studies  in  Kirkcaldy  made  him  eager 
to  contribute  to  the  fulfilment  of  the  omen.  Among  the 
authors  which  he  read  out  of  the  Edinburgh  University 
library  was  Gibbon,  who  pushed  Carlyle's  sceptical 
questionings  to  a  definite  point.  In  a  conversation 
with  Professor  Masson,  Carlyle  stated  that  to  his 
reading  of  Gibbon  he  dated  the  extirpation  from  his 
mind  of  the  last  remnant  that  had  been  left  in  it  of  the 
orthodox  belief  in  miracles. 

In  the  space  of  two  years,  Carlyle  and  Irving  '  got 
tired  of  schoolmastering  and  its  mean  contradictions 
and  poor  results.'  They  bade  Kirkcaldy  farewell  and 
made  for  Edinburgh, — Irving  to  lodge  in  Bristo  Street, 
1  more  expensive  rooms  than  mine/  naively  remarks 
Carlyle,  where  he  gave  breakfasts  to  *  Intellectualities 
he  fell  in  with,  I  often  a  guest  with  them.  They  were 
but  stupid  Intellectualities,  etc.*  -As  for  their  prospects, 
this  is  what  Carlyle  says :  '  Irving's  outlooks  in  Edin- 
burgh were  not  of  the  best,  considerably  checkered 
with  dubiety,  opposition,  or  even  flat  disfavour  in 
some  quarters ;  but  at  least  they  were  far  superior  to 


1 6  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

mine,  and  indeed,  I  was  beginning  my  four  or  five 
most  miserable,  dark,  sick,  and  heavy-laden  years; 
Irving,  after  some  staggerings  aback,  his  seven  or  eight 
healthiest  and  brightest.  He  had,  I  should  guess,  as 
one  item  several  good  hundreds  of  money  to  wait  upon. 
My  peculium  I  don't  recollect,  but  it  could  not  have 
exceeded  .£100.  I  was  without  friends,  experience,  or 
connection  in  the  sphere  of  human  business,  was  of  shy 
humour,  proud  enough  and  to  spare,  and  had  begun 
my  long  curriculum  of  dyspepsia  which  has  never  ended 
since ! '  *  Carlyle's  intention  was  to  study  for  the  Bar, 
if  perchance  he  could  eke  out  a  livelihood  by  private 
teaching.  He  obtained  one  or  two  pupils,  wrote  a  stray 
article  or  so  for  the  *  Encyclopaedias ' ;  but  as  he  barely 
managed  to  pay  his  way,  he  speedily  gave  up  his  law 
studies.  He  was  at  this  time — the  winter  of  1819 — 
'advancing,'  as  he  phrases  it,  *  towards  huge  instal- 
ments of  bodily  and  spiritual  wretchedness  in  this 
my  Edinburgh  purgatory.'  It  was  about  a  couple  of 
years  thereafter  ere  Carlyle  went  through  what  he  has 
described  as  his  '  spiritual  new  birth.' 

When  Carlyle  was  in  diligent  search  for  congenial 
employment,  a  certain  Captain  Basil  Hall  crossed  his 
path,  to  whom  Edward  Irving  had  given  lessons  in 
mathematics.  The  'small  lion,'  as  he  calls  the  cap- 
tain, came  to  Carlyle,  and  wished  the  latter  to  go  out 
with  him  'to  Dunglas,'  and  there  do  'lunars'  in  his 

*  Reminiscences ,  vol.  i.  p.  141. 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  17 

name,  he  looking  on  and  learning  of  Carlyle  'what 
would  come  of  its  own  will.'  The  said  'lunars' 
meanwhile  were  to  go  to  the  Admiralty,  c  testifying 
there  what  a  careful  studious  Captain  he  was,  and  help 
to  get  him  promotion,  so  the  little  wretch  smilingly 
told  me.'  Carlyle  adds :  '  I  remember  the  figure  of 
him  in  my  dim  lodging  as  a  gay,  crackling,  sniggering 
spectre,  one  dusk,  endeavouring  to  seduce  me  by 
affability  in  lieu  of  liberal  wages  into  this  adventure. 
Wages,  I  think,  were  to  be  smallish  ("  so  poor  are  we  "), 
but  then  the  great  Playfair  is  coming  on  visit.  "  You 
will  see  Professor  Playfair."  I  had  not  the  least  notion 
of  such  an  enterprise  on  these  shining  terms,  and 
Captain  Basil  with  his  great  Playfair  in  posse  vanished 
for  me  into  the  shades  of  dusk  for  good.'*  When 
private  teaching  would  not  come  Carlyle's  way,  he 
timorously  aimed  towards  '  literature.'  He  had  taken 
to  the  study  of  German,  and  conscious  of  his  own 
powers  in  that  direction,  he  applied  in  vain  to  more 
than  one  London  bookseller,  proposing  a  complete 
translation  of  Schiller.  Irving  not  only  did  his  utmost 
to  comfort  Carlyle  in  his  spiritual  wrestlings,  but  he 
tried  to  find  him  employment.  The  two  friends  con- 
tinued to  make  pleasant  excursions,  and  in  June  1821 
Irving  brought  Carlyle  to  Haddington,  an  event  which 
was  destined  to  colour  all  his  subsequent  life ;  for  it 
was  then  and  there  he  first  saw  Jane  Welsh,  a  sight,  he 
acknowledged,  for  ever  memorable  to  him. 
*  Reminiscences,  vol.  i.  p.  142. 


1 8  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

'In  the  ancient  County  Town  of  Haddington,  July  14, 
1801,  there  was  born,'  wrote  Thomas  Carlyle  in  1869, 
'  to  a  lately  wedded  pair,  not  natives  of  the  place  but 
already  reckoned  among  the  best  class  of  people  there, 
a  little  Daughter  whom  they  named  Jane  Baillie  Welsh, 
and  whose  subsequent  and  final  name  (her  own 
common  signature  for  many  years)  was  Jane  Welsh 
Carlyle,  and  now  so  stands,  now  that  she  is  mine  in 
death  only,  on  her  and  her  Father's  Tombstone  in  the 
Abbey  Kirk  of  that  Town.  July  i4th,  1801;  I  was 
then  in  my  sixth  year,  far  away  in  every  sense,  now 
near  and  infinitely  concerned,  trying  doubtfully  after 
some  three  years'  sad  cunctation,  if  there  is  anything 
that  I  can  profitably  put  on  record  of  her  altogether 
bright,  beneficent  and  modest  little  Life,  and  Her,  as  my 
final  task  in  this  world.'  *  The  picture  was  never  com- 
pleted by  the  master-hand;  the  'effort  was  too  dis- 
tressing ' ;  so  all  his  notes  and  letters  were  handed  over 
to  a  literary  executor. 

At  the  time  of  Carlyle's  introduction  to  Miss  Welsh, 
she  was  living  with  her  widowed  mother.  Her  father, 
Dr  John  Welsh,  came  of  a  good  family,  and  was  a 
popular  country  physician.  Her  mother  was  Grace 
Welsh  of  Capelgill,  and  was  reckoned  a  beautiful,  but 
haughty  woman.  Their  marriage  took  place  in  1800, 
and  their  only  child,  Jane,  was  born,  as  we  have  seen, 
the  year  following.  Her  most  intimate  friend,  Miss 

*  Reminiscences  t  vol.  ii.  p.  69. 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  19 

Geraldine  Jewsbury,  tells  us  that  Miss  Welsh  had  *a 
graceful  and  beautifully-formed  figure,  upright  and 
supple,  a  delicate  complexion  of  creamy  white,  with  a 
pale  rose  tint  in  the  cheeks,  lovely  eyes  full  of  fire  and 
softness,  and  with  great  depths  of  meaning.*  She  had 
a  musical  voice,  was  a  good  talker,  extremely  witty,  and 
so  fascinating  in  every  way  that  a  relative  of  hers  told 
Miss  Jewsbury  that  every  man  who  spoke  to  her  for 
five  minutes  felt  impelled  to  make  her  an  offer  of 
marriage.  Be  that  as  it  may,  it  is  certain  that  Miss 
Jane  Welsh  had  troops  of  suitors  in  and  around  the 
quiet  country  town.  She  always  spoke  of  her  mother 
with  deep  affection  and  great  admiration.  Her  father 
she  reverenced,  and  he  was  the  only  person  during  her 
girlhood  who  had  any  real  influence  over  her.  This, 
then,  was  the  young  lady  of  whom  Thomas  Carlyle 
carried  back  to  Edinburgh  a  sweet  and  lasting  impres- 
sion. They  corresponded  at  intervals,  and  Thomas 
was  permitted  to  send  her  books  occasionally. 

Edward  Irving  used  to  live  in  Dr  Welsh's  house 
when  he  taught  in  the  local  school,  and  he  led  Jeannie 
— a  winsome,  wilful  lass — to  take  an  interest  in  the 
classics.  She  entertained  a  girlish  passion  for  the 
handsome  youth,  and  there  can  be  little  doubt  that 
they  would  have  ultimately  been  married,  were  it  not 
that  the  eldest  daughter  of  a  Kirkcaldy  parson,  Miss 
Martin,  had  managed  to  charm  Irving  for  the  time 
being,'  and  an  engagement  followed. 


20  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

Before  Carlyle  had  drifted  into  Edinburgh  he  had, 
of  course,  heard  of  the  fame  of  Francis  Jeffrey.  He 
heard  him  once  speaking  in  the  General  Assembly  '  on 
some  poor  cause.'  Jeffrey's  pleading  seemed  to  Carlyle 
*  abundantly  clear,  full  of  liveliness,  free  flowing  in- 
genuity.' '  My  admiration,'  he  adds,  '  went  frankly 
with  that  of  others,  but  I  think  it  was  hardly  of  very 
deep  character.'  When  Carlyle  was  in  the  '  slough  of 
despond,'  he  bethought  him  of  Jeffrey,  this  time  as 
editor  of  the  Edinburgh  Review.  He  resolved  to 
try  the  '  great  man '  with  an  actual  contribution.  The 
subject  was  a  condemnation  of  a  new  French  book,  in 
which  a  mechanical  theory  of  gravitation  was  elabor- 
ately worked  out  by  the  author.  He  got  'a  certain 
feeble  but  enquiring  quasi-disciple '  of  his  own  to  act 
as  amanuensis,  from  whom  he  kept  his  ulterior  purpose 
quite  secret.  Looking  back  through  the  dim  vista  of 
seven-and-forty  years,  this  is  what  Carlyle  says  of  that 
anxious  time :  '  Well  do  I  remember  those  dreary  even- 
ings in  Bristo  Street;  oh,  what  ghastly  passages  and 
dismal  successive  spasms  of  attempt  at  "  literary  enter- 
prise "  I  ...  My  "  Review  of  Pictet  "  all  fairly  written 
out  in  George  Dalgliesh's  good  clerk  hand,  I  penned 
some  brief  polite  Note  to  the  great  Editor,  and  walked 
off  with  the  small  Parcel  one  night  to  his  address  in 
George  Street.  I  very  well  remember  leaving  it  with 
his  valet  there,  and  disappearing  in  the  night  with 
various  thoughts  and  doubts !  My  hopes  had  never 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  21 

risen  high,  or  in  fact  risen  at  all ;  but  for  a  fortnight 
or  so  they  did  not  quite  die  out,  and  then  it  was  in 
absolute  zero ;  no  answer,  no  return  of  MS.,  absolutely 
no  notice  taken,  which  was  a  form  of  catastrophe  more 
complete  than  even  I  had  anticipated  !  There  rose  in 
my  head  a  pungent  little  Note  which  might  be  written 
to  the  great  man,  with  neatly  cutting  considerations 
offered  him  from  the  small  unknown  ditto ;  but  I  wisely 
judged  it  was  still  more  dignified  to  let  the  matter  lie 
as  it  was,  and  take  what  I  had  got  for  my  own  benefit 
only.  Nor  did  I  ever  mention  it  to  almost  anybody, 
least  of  all  to  Jeffrey  in  subsequent  changed  times, 
when  at  anyrate  it  was  fallen  extinct.'  * 

Carlyle's  star  was,  however,  in  the  ascendant,  for  in 
1822  he  became  tutor  to  the  two  sons  of  a  wealthy 
lady,  Mrs  Charles  Buller,  at  a  salary  of  £200  a  year. 
It  was  through  Irving  that  this  appointment  came. 
The  young  lads  boarded  with  *  a  good  old  Dr  Fleming  * 
in  George  Square,  whither  Carlyle  went  daily  from  his 
lodgings  at  ts  Moray  Street,  Pilrig  Street  The  Bullers 
finally  returned  to  London,  Carlyle  staying  at  his 
father's  little  homestead  of  Mainhill  to  finish  a  transla- 
tion of  '  Wilhelm  Meister.'  He  followed  the  Bullers 
to  London,  where  he  resigned  the  tutorship  in  the 
hope  of  getting  some  literary  work. 

Irving  introduced  him  to  the  proprietor  of  the 
London  Magazine,  who  offered  Carlyle  sixteen 

*  Reminiscences,  vol.  ii.  pp.  18,  19. 
t  Now  2  Spey  Street. 


22  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

guineas  a  sheet  for  a  series  of  '  Portraits  of  Men  of 
Genius  and  Character.'  The  first  was  to  be  a  life  of 
Schiller,  which  appeared  in  that  periodical  in  1823-4. 
Mr  Boyd,  the  Edinburgh  publisher,  accepted  the  trans- 
lation of  'Wilhelm  Meister.'  'Two  years  before/ 
wrote  Carlyle  in  his  Reminiscences,  'I  had  at  length, 
after  some  repulsions,  got  into  the  heart  of  "  Wilhelm 
Meister,"  and  eagerly  read  it  through;  my  sally  out, 
after  finishing,  along  the  vacant  streets  of  Edinburgh, 
(a  windless,  Scotch-misty  Saturday  night),  is  still  vivid 
to  me.  "  Grand,  surely,  harmoniously  built  together, 
far-seeing,  wise,  and  true :  when,  for  many  years,  or 
almost  in  my  life  before,  have  I  read  such  a  book  ?  " ; 
A  short  letter  from  Goethe  in  Weimar,  in  acknow- 
ledgment of  a  copy  of  his  'Wilhelm  Meister,'  was 
peculiarly  gratifying  to  Carlyle. 

Carlyle  was  not  happy  in  London;  dyspepsia  and 
'  the  noises '  sorely  troubled  him.  He  was  anxious  to 
be  gone.  To  the  surprise  of  Irving — who  was  now 
settled  in  the  metropolis — and  everybody  else,  he  re- 
solutely decided  to  return  to  Annandale,  where  his 
father  had  leased  for  him  a  compact  little  farm  at 
Hoddam  Hill,  three  miles  from  Mainhill,  and  visible 
from  the  fields  at  the  back  of  it.  '  Perhaps  it  was  the 
very  day  before  my  departure,'  wrote  Carlyle,  '  at  least 
it  is  the  last  I  recollect  of  him  [Irving],  we  were  walk- 
ing  in  the  streets  multifariously  discoursing  ;  a  dim 
grey  day,  but  dry  and  airy ; — at  the  corner  of  Cockspur 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  23 

Street  we  paused  for  a  moment,  meeting  Sir  John  Sin- 
clair ("Statistical  Account  of  Scotland"  etc.),  whom  I 
had  never  seen  before  and  never  saw  again.  A  lean 
old  man,  tall  but  stooping,  in  tartan  cloak,  face  very 
wrinkly,  nose  blue,  physiognomy  vague  and  with  dis- 
tinction as  one  might  have  expected  it  to  be.  He 
spoke  to  Irving  with  benignant  respect,  whether  to  me 
at  all  I  don't  recollect.' 

Carlyle  shook  the  dust  of  London  from  off  his  feet, 
and  by  easy  stages  made  his  way  northwards.  Arrived 
at  Ecclefechan,  within  two  miles  of  his  father's  house, 
while  the  coach  was  changing  horses,  Carlyle  noticed 
through  the  window  his  little  sister  Jean  earnestly  look- 
ing up  for  him.  She,  with  Jenny,  the  youngest  of  the 
family,  was  at  school  in  the  village,  and  had  come 
out  daily  to  inspect  the  coach  in  hope  of  seeing  him. 
'  Her  bonny  little  blush  and  radiancy  of  look  when  I 
let  down  the  window  and  suddenly  disclosed  myself,' 
wrote  Carlyle  in  1867,  'are  still  present  to  me.'  On 
the  26th  of  May  1825,  he  established  himself  at 
Hoddam  Hill,  and  set  about  '  German  Romance.'  His 
brother  Alick  managed  the  farm,  and  his  mother,  with 
one  of  the  girls,  was  generally  there  to  look  after  his 
comforts. 

During  the  intervening  years,  Carlyle's  intimacy  with 
Miss  Jane  Welsh  gradually  increased,  with  occasional 
differences.  She  had  promised  to  marry  him  if  he 
could  '  achieve  independence.'  Carlyle's  idea  was  that 


24  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

after  their  marriage  they  should  settle  upon  the  farm 
of  Craigenputtock,  which  had  been  in  the  possession 
of  the  Welsh  family  for  generations,  and  devote  himself 
to  literary  work.  By  and  by  Miss  Welsh  accepted  his 
offer  of  marriage,  but  not  until  she  had  acquainted  him 
of  the  Irving  incident.  The  wedding  took  place  on 
the  i  yth  of  October  1825,  and  the  young  couple  took 
up  housekeeping  in  a  quiet  cottage  at  Comely  Bank, 
Edinburgh.  Of  his  life  at  this  period,  the  best  descrip- 
tion is  given  by  Carlyle  himself,  in  a  letter  to  Mrs 
Basil  Montague,  dated  Christmas  Day  1826  : — 

'In  spite  of  ill-health  I  reckon  myself  moderately 
happy  here,  much  happier  than  men  usually  are,  or  than 
such  a  fool  as  I  deserve  to  be.  My  good  wife  exceeds 
all  my  hopes,  and  is,  in  truth,  I  believe,  among  the  best 
women  that  the  world  contains.  The  philosophy  of 
the  heart  is  far  better  than  that  of  the  understanding. 
She  loves  me  with  her  whole  soul,  and  this  one  senti- 
ment has  taught  her  much  that  I  have  long  been  vainly 
at  the  schools  to  learn.  ...  On  the  whole,  what  I 
chiefly  want  is  occupation;  which,  when  the  times 
grow  better,  or  my  own  genius  gets  more  alert  and 
thorough-going,  will  not  fail,  I  suppose,  to  present 
itself.  .  .  .  Some  day — oh,  that  the  day  were  here  ! — I 
shall  surely  speak  out  those  things  that  are  lying  in  me, 
and  give  me  no  sleep  till  they  are  spoken  !  Or  else,  if 
the  Fates  would  be  so  kind  as  to  shew  me — that  I  had 
nothing  to  say !  This,  perhaps,  is  the  real  secret  of  it 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  25 

after  all ;  a  hard  result,  yet  not  intolerable,  were  it  once 
clear  and  certain.  Literature,  it  seems,  is  to  be  my 
trade,  but  the  present  aspects  of  it  among  us  seem  to 
me  peculiarly  perplexed  and  uninviting.'  *  Here,  as  in 
undertone,  we  discover  what  Professor  Masson  calls  the 
constitutional  sadness  of  Carlyle — a  sadness  which, 
along  with  indifferent  health,  led  him  to  be  impatient 
at  trifles,  morbid,  proud,  and  at  times  needlessly  aggres- 
sive in  speech  and  demeanour.  These  traits,  however, 
in  the  early  years  of  married  life  were  not  specially 
visible;  and  on  the  whole  the  Comely  Bank  period 
may  be  described  as  one  of  calm  happiness.  Carlyle's 
forecast  was  correct.  Literature  was  to  be  his  trade. 

In  the  following  spring  came  a  letter  to  Carlyle  from 
Procter  (Barry  Cornwall),  whom  he  had  met  in  London, 
offering  to  introduce  him  formally  to  Jeffrey,  whom  he 
certified  to  be  a  'very  fine  fellow.'  One  evening 
Carlyle  sallied  forth  from  Comely  Bank  for  Jeffrey's 
house  in  George  Street,  armed  with  Procter's  letter. 
He  was  shown  into  the  study.  '  Fire,  pair  of  candles,' 
he  relates,  'were  cheerfully  burning,  in  the  light  of 
which  sate  my  famous  little  gentleman ;  laid  aside  his 
work,  cheerfully  invited  me  to  sit,  and  began  talking  in 
a  perfectly  human  manner.'  The  interview  lasted  for 
about  twenty  minutes,  during  which  time  Jeffrey  had 
made  kind  enquiries  what  his  visitor  was  doing  and 
what  he  had  published ;  adding,  '  We  must  give  you  a 

*  Masson's  '  Edinburgh  Sketches  and  Memories,'  pp.  329-30. 


26  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

lift,'  an  offer,  Carlyle  says,  which  in  '  some  complimen- 
tary way '  he  managed  to  Jeffrey's  satisfaction  to  decline. 
Jeffrey  returned  Carlyle's  call,  when  he  was  captivated 
by  Mrs  Carlyle.  The  intimacy  rapidly  increased,  and 
a  short  paper  by  Carlyle  on  Jean  Paul  appeared  in  the 
very  next  issue  of  the  Edinburgh  Review.  f  It 
made,'  says  the  author,  'what  they  call  a  sensation 
among  the  Edinburgh  buckrams ;  which  was  greatly 
heightened  next  Number  by  the  more  elaborate  and 
grave  article  on  "  German  Literature  "  generally,  which 
set  many  tongues  wagging,  and  some  few  brains  con- 
sidering, what  this  strange  monster  could  be  that  was 
come  to  disturb  their  quiescence  and  the  established 
order  of  Nature  !  Some  Newspapers  or  Newspaper  took 
to  denouncing  "  the  Mystic  School,"  which  my  bright 
little  Woman  declared  to  consist  of  me  alone,  or  of  her 
and  me,  and  for  a  long  while  after  merrily  used  to 
designate  us  by  that  title.' 

Mrs  Carlyle  proved  an  admirable  hostess ;  Jeffrey 
became  a  frequent  visitor  at  Comely  Bank,  and  they 
discovered  '  mutual  old  cousinships  '  by  the  maternal 
side.  Jeffrey's  friendship  was  an  immense  acquisition 
to  Carlyle,  and  everybody  regarded  it  as  his  highest 
good  fortune.  The  literati  of  Edinburgh  came  to  see 
her,  and  '  listen  to  her  husband's  astonishing  mono- 
logues.' To  Carlyle's  regret,  Jeffrey  would  not  talk  in 
their  frequent  rambles  of  his  experiences  in  the  world, 
'  nor  of  things  concrete  and  current,'  but  was  '  theoretic 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  27 

generally';  and  seemed  bent  on  converting  Carlyle 
from  his  'German  mysticism,'  back  merely,  as  the 
latter  could  perceive,  into  c  dead  Edinburgh  Whiggism, 
scepticism,  and  materialism ' ;  '  what  I  felt,'  says 
Carlyle,  '  to  be  a  forever  impossible  enterprise.'  They 
had  long  discussions,  '  parryings,  and  thrustings,'  which 
1 1  have  known  continue  night  after  night,'  relates 
Carlyle,  '  till  two  or  three  in  the  morning  (when  I  was 
his  guest  at  Craigcrook,  as  once  or  twice  happened  in 
coming  years) :  there  he  went  on  in  brisk  logical 
exercise  with  all  the  rest  of  the  house  asleep,  and 
parted  usually  in  good  humour,  though  after  a  game 
which  was  hardly  worth  the  candle.  I  found  him 
infinitely  witty,  ingenious,  sharp  of  fence,  but  not  in 
any  sense  deep  \  and  used  without  difficulty  to  hold 
my  own  with  him.'  Jeffrey  did  everything  in  his  power 
to  further  Carlyle's  prospects  and  projects.  He  tried 
to  obtain  for  him  the  professorship  of  Moral  Philosophy 
at  St  Andrews  University,  vacated  by  Dr  Chalmers. 
Testimonials  were  given  by  Irving,  Brewster,  Buller, 
Wilson,  Jeffrey,  and  Goethe.  They  failed,  however,  in 
consequence  of  the  opposition  of  the  Principal,  Dr 
Nicol. 

To  Carlyle,  doubtless,  the  most  memorable  incidents 
of  the  Edinburgh  period  was  his  correspondence  with 
Goethe.  The  magnetic  spell  thrown  over  Carlyle  by 
Goethe  will  ever  remain  a  mystery.  Between  the  two 
men  there  was  no  intellectual  affinity.  One  would 


28  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

have  expected  Goethe  the  Pagan  to  have  repelled 
Carlyle  the  Puritan,  unless  we  have  recourse  to  the 
philosophy  of  opposites,  and  conclude  that  the  tumul- 
tuous soul  of  Carlyle  found  congenial  repose  in  the 
Greek-like  restfulness  of  Goethe.  The  great  German 
had  been  deeply  impressed  by  the  profound  grasp 
which  Carlyle  was  displaying  of  German  literature. 
After  reading  a  letter  which  he  had  received  from 
Walter  Scott,  Goethe  remarked  to  Eckermann :  "  I 
almost  wonder  that  Walter  Scott  does  not  say  a  word 
about  Carlyle,  who  has  so  decided  a  German  tendency 
that  he  must  certainly  be  known  to  him.  It  is  admir- 
able in  Carlyle,  that,  in  his  judgment  of  our  German 
authors,  he  has  especially  in  view  the  mental  and  moral 
core  as  that  which  is  really  influential.  Carlyle  is  a 
moral  force  of  great  importance  ;  there  is  in  him  much 
for  the  future  and  we  cannot  foresee  what  he  will 
produce  and  effect' 


CHAPTER  II 

CRAIGENPUTTOCK LITERARY    EFFORTS 

CARLYLE  was  feeling  the  force  of  Scott's  remark  that 
literature  was  a  bad  crutch — his  prospects  being  far 
from  bright.  The  Carlyles  had  been  a  little  over 
eighteen  months  at  Comely  Bank,  when  their  exten- 
sive circle  of  friends  were  surprised  to  hear  of  their 
intended  withdrawal  to  Craigenputtock.  Efforts  were 
made  to  dissuade  Carlyle  from  pursuing  what  at  the 
time  appeared  a  suicidal  course.  He  was  the  intimate 
associate  of  the  brilliant  Jeffrey;  he  was  within  the 
charmed  circle  of  Edinburgh  Reviewers ;  he  had  laid 
the  foundation  of  a  literary  reputation.  Outwardly  all 
seemed  well  with  Carlyle ;  but  '  the  step/  himself  says, 
*  had  been  well  meditated,  saw  itself  to  be  founded  on 
irrefragable  considerations  of  health,  finance,  &c.,  &c., 
unknown  to  bystanders,  and  could  not  be  forborne  or 
altered.*  Next  to  his  marriage  with  Miss  Welsh, 
Carlyle's  retirement  to  the  howling  wilds  of  Craigen- 
puttock at  that  juncture  was  the  most  momentous  step 
in  his  long  life.  He  was  conscious  of  his  own  powers, 
and  he  clearly  discerned  how  those  powers  could  best 


30  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

be  utilised  and  developed.  Hence  his  determin- 
ation to  bid  adieu  to  Edinburgh.  And  in  that 
resolve  he  was  fortified  by  the  loyal  support  of  his 
wife. 

Jeffrey  promised  to  visit  the  Carlyles  at  Craigen- 
puttock  as  soon  as  they  got  settled.  Meanwhile,  they 
stayed  a  week  at  his  own  house  in  Moray  Place,  after 
their  furniture  was  on  the  road,  and  they  were  waiting 
till  it  should  arrive  and  c  render  a  new  home  possible 
amid  the  moors  and  the  mountains/  'Of  our  his- 
tory at  Craigenputtock/  says  Carlyle,  '  there  might  a 
great  deal  be  written  which  might  amuse  the  curious  ; 
for  it  was  in  fact  a  very  singular  scene  and  arena  for 
such  a  pair  as  my  Darling  and  me,  with  such  a  Life 
ahead.  ...  It  is  a  History  I  by  no  means  intend 
to  write,  with  such  or  with  any  object.  To  me  there 
is  a  sacredness  of  interest  in  it  consistent  only  with 
silence.  It  was  the  field  of  endless  nobleness  and 
beautiful  talent  and  virtue  in  Her  who  is  now  gone ; 
also  of  good  industry,  and  many  loving  and  blessed 
thoughts  in  myself,  while  living  there  by  her  side. 
Poverty  and  mean  Obstruction  had  given  origin  to  it, 
and  continued  to  preside  over  it,  but  were  transformed 
by  human  valour  of  various  sorts  into  a  kind  of  victory 
and  royalty :  something  of  high  and  great  dwelt  in  it, 
though  nothing  could  be  smaller  and  lower  than  very 
many  of  the  details.'* 

*  Reminiscences,  vol.  ii.  p.  30. 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  31 

The  Jeffreys  were  not  slow  in  appearing  at  Craigen- 
puttock.  Their  '  big  Carriage,'  narrates  the  humorous 
host,  '  climbed  our  rugged  Hill-roads,  landed  the  Three 
Guests — young  Charlotte  ("Sharlie"),  with  Pa  and  Ma 
— and  the  clever  old  Valet  maid  that  waited  on  them ; 
.  .  .  but  I  remember  nothing  so  well  as  the  con- 
summate art  with  which  my  Dear  One  played  the 
domestic  field-marshal,  and  spread  out  our  exiguous 
resources,  without  fuss  or  bustle ;  to  cover  everything 
with  a  coat  of  hospitality  and  even  elegance  and  abund- 
ance. I  have  been  in  houses  ten  times,  nay,  a  hundred 
times,  as  rich,  where  things  went  not  so  well.  Though 
never  bred  to  this,  but  brought  up  in  opulent  plenty  by 
a  mother  that  could  bear  no  partnership  in  housekeeping, 
she,  finding  it  become  necessary,  loyally  applied  herself 
to  it,  and  soon  surpassed  in  it  all  the  women  I  have  ever 
seen.'  *  Of  Mrs  Carlyle's  frankness  her  husband  gives 
this  amusing  glimpse :  '  One  day  at  dinner,  I  remember, 
Jeffrey  admired  the  fritters  or  bits  of  pancake  he  was 
eating,  and  she  let  him  know,  not  without  some  vestige 
of  shock  to  him,  that  she  had  made  them.  "  What, 
you  !  twirl  up  the  frying-pan,  and  catch  them  in  the 
air?"  Even  so,  my  high  friend,  and  you  may  turn 
it  over  in  your  mind  ! '  When  the  Jeffreys  were  leav- 
ing, '  I  remarked,'  says  Carlyle,  that  they  '  carried  off 
our  little  temporary  paradise;  ...  to  which  bit  of 
pathos  Jeffrey  answered  by  a  friendly  little  sniff  of 
*  Reminiscences,  vol.  ii.  p.  31. 


32  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

quasi-mockery  or  laughter  through  the  nose,  and  rolled 
prosperously  away.' 

The  Carlyles  in  course  of  time  visited  the  Jeffreys 
at  Craigcrook,  the  last  occasion  being  for  about  a  fort- 
night. Carlyle  says  it  was  'a  shining  sort  of  affair, 
but  did  not  in  effect  accomplish  much  for  any  of 
us.  Perhaps,  for  one  thing,  we  stayed  too  long, 
Jeffrey  was  beginning  to  be  seriously  incommoded  in 
health,  had  bad  sleep,  cared  not  how  late  he  sat,  and 
we  had  now  more  than  ever  a  series  of  sharp  fencing 
bouts,  night  after  night,  which  could  decide  nothing 
for  either  of  us,  except  our  radical  incompatibility  in 
respect  of  World  Theory,  and  the  incurable  divergence 
of  our  opinions  on  the  most  important  matters.  "  You 
are  so  dreadfully  in  earnest ! "  said  he  to  me  once  or 
oftener.  Besides,  I  own  now  I  was  deficient  in  rever- 
ence to  him,  and  had  not  then,  nor,  alas !  have  ever 
acquired,  in  my  solitary  and  mostly  silent  existence,  the 
art  of  gently  saying  strong  things,  or  of  insinuating  my 
dissent,  instead  of  uttering  it  right  out  at  the  risk  of 
offence  or  otherwise.'  Then  he  adds  :  *  These  "  stormy 
sittings,"  as  Mrs  Jeffrey  laughingly  called  them,  did  not 
improve  our  relation  to  one  another.  But  these  were 
the  last  we  had  of  that  nature.  In  other  respects 
Edinburgh  had  been  barren ;  effulgences  of  "  Edin- 
burgh Society,"  big  dinners,  parties,  we  in  due  measure 
had;  but  nothing  there  was  very  interesting  either  to 
Her  or  to  me,  and  all  of  it  passed  away  as  an  obliging 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  33 

pageant  merely.  Well  do  I  remember  our  return  to 
Craigenputtock,  after  nightfall,  amid  the  clammy  yellow 
leaves  and  desolate  rains  with  the  clink  of  Alick's 
stithy  alone  audible  of  human/  * 

It  was  during  his  first  two  years'  residence  at  Craigen- 
puttock that  Carlyle  wrote  his  famous  essay  on  Burns ; 
but  his  principal  work  was  upon  German  literature, 
especially  upon  Goethe.  His  magazine  writings  being 
his  only  means  of  support,  and  as  he  devoted  much 
time  to  them,  it  is  not  surprising  that  financial  matters 
worried  him.  About  this  time  Jeffrey,  to  whom  doubt- 
less he  confided  his  trouble,  generously  offered  to 
confer  upon  him  an  annuity  of  ;£ioo,  which  Carlyle 
declined  to  accept.  Jeffrey  repeated  the  offer  on  two 
subsequent  occasions,  with  a  like  result.  Carlyle  in 
his  Reminiscences  says  that  he  could  not  doubt  but 
Jeffrey  had  intended  an  act  of  real  generosity  ;  and  yet 
Carlyle  penned  the  ungracious  remark,  that  'perhaps 
there  was  something  in  the  manner  of  it  that  savoured 
of  consciousness  and  of  screwing  one's  self  up  to  the 
point ;  less  of  god-like  pity  for  a  fine  fellow  and  his 
struggles,  than  of  human  determination  to  do  a  fine 
action  of  one's  own,  which  might  add  to  the  prompti- 
tude of  my  refusal.'  It  is  not  surprising,  therefore,  to 
find  Carlyle  suspecting  that  Jeffrey's  feelings  were  cool- 
ing towards  him.  Jeffrey  had  powers  of  penetration  as 
well  as  the  friend  whom  he  was  anxious  to  assist. 

*  Reminiscences ,  vol.  ii.  pp.  40,  41. 
I  C 


34  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

By  the  month  of  February  1831,  Carlyle's  finances 
fell  so  low  that  he  had  only  £$  in  his  possession,  and 
expected  no  more  for  months.  Then  he  borrowed 
;£ioo  from  Jeffrey,  as  his  'pitiful  bits  of  periodical 
literature  incomings/  as  he  puts  it,  '  having  gone  awry 
(as  they  were  liable  to  do),  but  was  able,  I  still  remember 
with  what  satisfaction,  to  repay  punctually  within  a  few 
weeks ' ;  adding,  '  and  this  was  all  of  pecuniary  chivalry 
we  two  ever  had  between  us.'  The  chivalry  was  all  on 
the  one  side — of  Jeffrey.  The  outcome  of  his  labours 
at  Craigenputtock,  in  addition  to  the  fragmentary 
articles  already  referred  to,  was  the  essays  which  form 
the  first  three  volumes  of  the  '  Miscellanies.'  They 
appeared  chiefly  in  the  Edinburgh  Review,  the 
Foreign  Review,  and  Fraser*s  Magazine.  Jeffrey's 
resignation  of  the  editorship  of  the  'Review'  was  a 
great  disappointment  to  Carlyle,  because  it  stopped  a 
regular  source  of  income. 

German  literature,  of  which  Carlyle  had  begun  a 
history,  not  being  a  'marketable  commodity,'  he  cut 
it  up  into  articles.  '  My  last  considerable  bit  of 
Writing  at  Craigenputtock,'  says  Carlyle,  c  was  "  Sartor 
Resartus";  done,  I  think,  between  January  and  August 
1830 ;  (my  sister  Margaret  had  died  while  it  was  going 
on).  I  well  remember  where  and  how  (at  Templand 
one  morning)  the  germ  of  it  rose  above  ground.  "  Nine 
months,"  I  used  to  say,  "it  had  cost  me  in  writing." 
Had  the  perpetual  fluctuation,  the  uncertainty  and  un- 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  35 

intelligible  whimsicality  of  Review  Editors  not  proved 
so  intolerable,  we  might  have  lingered  longer  at  Craigen- 
puttock,  perfectly  left  alone,  and  able  to  do  more  work, 
beyond  doubt,  than  elsewhere.  But  a  Book  did  seem 
to  promise  some  respite  from  that,  and  perhaps  further 
advantages.  Teufelsdrockh  was  ready  ;  and  (first  days 
of  August)  I  decided  to  make  for  London.  Night  be- 
fore going,  how  I  still  remember  it !  I  was  lying  on 
my  back  on  the  sofa  in  the  drawing-room ;  she  sitting 
by  the  table  (late  at  night,  packing  all  done,  I  suppose) ; 
her  words  had  a  guise  of  sport,  but  were  profoundly 
plaintive  in  meaning.  "  About  to  part,  who  knows  for 
how  long ;  and  what  may  have  come  in  the  interim  ! " 
this  was  her  thought,  and  she  was  evidently  much  out 
of  spirits.  "  Courage,  Dearie,  only  for  a  month  ! "  I 
would  say  to  her  in  some  form  or  other.  I  went  next 
morning  early.'  * 

Jeffrey,  who  was  by  that  time  Lord  Advocate, 
Carlyle  found  much  preoccupied  in  London,  but 
willing  to  assist  him  with  Murray,  the  bookseller. 
Jeffrey,  with  his  wife  and  daughter,  lived  in  Jermyn 
Street  in  lodgings,  'in  melancholy  contrast  to  the 
beautiful  tenements  and  perfect  equipments  they  had 
left  in  the  north.'  'If,'  says  Carlyle,  'I  called  in  the 
morning,  in  quest  perhaps  of  Letters  (though  I  don't 
recollect  much  troubling  him  in  that  way),  I  would  find 
the  family  still  at  breakfast,  ten  A.M.  or  later  ;  and  have 
*  Reminiscences,  vol.  ii.  pp.  161,  162. 


36  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

seen  poor  Jeffrey  emerge  in  flowered  dressing-gown, 
with  a  most  boiled  and  suffering  expression  of  face, 
like  one  who  had  slept  miserably,  and  now  awoke 
mainly  to  paltry  misery  and  bother  j  poor  Official  man  ! 
"  I  am  made  a  mere  Post-Office  of ! "  I  heard  him  once 
grumble,  after  tearing  open  several  Packets,  not  one  of 
which  was  internally  for  himself.'  * 

Mrs  Carlyle  joined  her  husband  on  the  ist  of 
October  1831,  and  they  took  lodgings  at  4  Ampton 
Street,  Gray's  Inn  Lane,  with  a  family  of  the  name  of 
Miles,  belonging  to  Irving's  congregation.  Jeffrey  was 
a  frequent  visitor  there,  and  sometimes  the  Carlyles 
called  at  Jermyn  Street.  Carlyle  says  that  they  were 
at  first  rather  surprised  that  Jeffrey  did  not  introduce 
him  to  some  of  his  '  grand  literary  figures,'  or  try  in 
some  way  to  be  of  help  to  one  for  whom  he  evidently 
had  a  value.  The  explanation,  Carlyle  thinks,  was 
that  he  himself  '  expressed  no  trace  of  aspiration  that 
way';  that  Jeffrey's  'grand  literary  or  other  figures' 
were  clearly  by  no  means  'so  adorable  to  the  rustic 
hopelessly  Germanised  soul  as  an  introducer  of  one 
might  have  wished.'  Besides,  Jeffrey  was  so  '  heartily 
miserable,'  as  to  think  Carlyle  and  his  other  fellow- 
creatures  happy  in  comparison,  and  to  have  no  care 
left  to  bestow  upon  them. 

Here  is  a  characteristic  outburst  in  the  'Reminis- 
cences': 'The  beggarly  history  of  poor  "Sartor" 
*  Reminiscences •,  vol.  ii.  p,  47. 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  37 

among  the  blockheadisms  is  not  worth  my  recording  or 
remembering — least  of  all  here  !  In  short,  finding  that 
whereas  I  had  got  ^100  (if  memory  serve)  for 
"  Schiller  "  six  or  seven  years  before,  and  for  "  Sartor," 
at  least  thrice  as  good,  I  could  not  only  not  get  ^200, 
but  even  get  no  Murray,  or  the  like,  to  publish  it  on 
half-profits  (Murray,  a  most  stupendous  object  to  me ; 
tumbling  about,  eyeless,  with  the  evidently  strong  wish 
to  say  "yes  and  no";  my  first  signal  experience  of 
that  sad  human  predicament) ;  I  said,  "  We  will  make 
it  No,  then ;  wrap  up  our  MS. ;  wait  till  this  Reform 
Bill  uproar  abate." '  * 

On  Tuesday,  January  26th,  1832,  Carlyle  received 
tidings  of  the  death  of  his  father.  He  departed  on  the 
Sunday  morning  previous  'almost  without  a  struggle,' 
wrote  his  favourite  sister  Jane.  It  was  a  heavy  stroke 
for  Carlyle.  '  Natural  tears/  he  exclaimed  shortly  after- 
wards, 'have  come  to  my  relief.  I  can  look  at  my 
dear  Father,  and  that  section  of  the  Past  which  he  has 
made  alive  for  me,  in  a  certain  sacred,  sanctified  light, 
and  give  way  to  what  thoughts  rise  in  me  without 
feeling  that  they  are  weak  and  useless.'  Carlyle 
determined  that  the  time  till  the  funeral  was  past 
(Friday)  should  be  spent  with  his  wife  only.  All 
others  were  excluded.  He  walked  '  far  and  much,' 
chiefly  in  the  Regent's  Park,  and  considered  about 
many  things,  his  object  being  to  see  clearly  what  his 
*  Reminiscences ,  vol.  ii.  p.  162. 


38  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

calamity  meant — what  he  lost,  and  what  lesson  that 
loss  was  to  teach  him.  Carlyle  considered  his  father  as 
one  of  the  most  interesting  men  he  had  known.  '  Were 
you  to  ask  me,'  he  said,  '  which  had  the  greater  natural 
faculty/  Robert  Burns  or  my  father,  '  I  might,  perhaps, 
actually  pause  before  replying.  Burns  had  an  in- 
finitely wider  Education,  my  Father  a  far  wholesomer. 
Besides,  the  one  was  a  man  of  Musical  Utterance ;  the 
other  wholly  a  man  of  Action,  even  with  Speech  sub- 
servient thereto.  Never,  of  all  the  men  I  have  seen, 
has  one  come  personally  in  my  way  in  whom  the  en- 
dowment from  Nature  and  the  Arena  from  Fortune 
were  so  utterly  out  of  all  proportion.  I  have  said  this 
often,  and  partly  know  it.  As  a  man  of  Speculation — 
had  Culture  ever  unfolded  him — he  must  have  gone  wild 
and  desperate  as  Burns ;  but  he  was  a  man  of  Conduct, 
and  Work  keeps  all  right.  What  strange  shapeable 
creatures  we  are ! '  *  Nothing  that  the  elder  Carlyle 
undertook  to  do  but  he  did  it  faithfully,  and  like  a  true 
man.  *  I  shall  look/  said  his  distinguished  son,  '  on  the 
houses  he  built  with  a  certain  proud  interest.  They  stand 
firm  and  sound  to  the  heart  all  over  his  little  district. 
No  one  that  comes  after  him  will  ever  say,  "  Here  was 
the  finger  of  a  hollow  eye-servant."  They  are  little  texts 
for  me  of  the  gospel  of  man's  free  will.  Nor  will  his 
deeds  and  sayings  in  any  case  be  found  unworthy — 
not  false  and  barren,  but  genuine  and  fit.  Nay,  am 
*  Reminiscences ,  vol.  i.  p.  19. 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  & 

not  I  also  the  humble  James  Carlyle's  work?  I 
owe  him  much  more  than  existence;  I  owe  him  a 
noble  inspiring  example  (now  that  I  can  read  it  in 
that  rustic  character).  It  was  he  exclusively  that  deter- 
mined on  educating  me ;  that  from  his  small  hard- 
earned  funds  sent  me  to  school  and  college,  and  made 
me  whatever  I  am  or  may  become.  Let  me  not 
mourn  for  my  father,  let  me  do  worthily  of  him.  So 
shall  he  still  live  even  here  in  me,  and  his  worth  plant 
itself  honourably  forth  into  new  generations.'  *  One 
of  the  wise  men  about  Ecclefechan  told  James  Carlyle : 
'  Educate  a  boy,  and  he  grows  up  to  despise  his 
ignorant  parents.'  His  father  once  told  Carlyle  this, 
and  added  :  '  Thou  hast  not  done  so ;  God  be  thanked 
for  it.'  When  James  Carlyle  first  entered  his  son's 
house  at  Craigenputtock,  Mrs  Carlyle  was  greatly 
struck  with  him,  'and  still  farther,'  says  her  husband, 
'  opened  my  eyes  to  the  treasure  I  possessed  in  a  father.' 
The  last  time  Carlyle  saw  his  father  was  a  few  days 
before  leaving  for  London.  '  He  was  very  kind,'  wrote 
Carlyle,  '  seemed  prouder  of  me  than  ever.  What  he 
had  never  done  the  like  of  before,  he  said,  on  hearing  me 
express  something  which  he  admired,  "  Man,  it's  surely 
a  pity  that  thou  should  sit  yonder  with  nothing  but 
the  eye  of  Omniscience  to  see  thee,  and  thou  with  such 
a  gift  to  speak." '  In  closing  his  affectionate  tribute, 
Carlyle  exclaims :  '  Thank  Heaven,  I  know  and  have 
*  Reminiscences,  vol.  i,  p.  6. 


40  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

known  what  it  is  to  be  a  son  ;  to  love  a  father,  as  spirit 
can  love  spirit.' 

The  last  days  of  March  1832  found  the  Carlyles 
back  at  Craigenputtock.  A  new  tenant  occupied  the 
farm,  and  their  days  were  lonelier  than  ever.  Mean- 
while c  Sartor  Resartus '  was  appearing  in  fraser's 
Magazine.  The  Editor  reported  that  it  *  excited  the 
most  unqualified  disapprobation.'  Nothing  daunted, 
Carlyle  pursued  the  '  noiseless  tenor  of  his  way,'  throw- 
ing off  articles  on  various  subjects.  Finding  that  Mrs 
Carlyle's  health  suffered  from  the  gloom  and  solitude 
of  Craigenputtock,  they  removed  to  Edinburgh  in 
January  1833.  Jeffrey  was  absent  in  '  official  regions,' 
and  Carlyle  notes  that  they  found  a  *  most  dreary  con- 
temptible kind  of  element '  in  Edinburgh.  But  their 
stay  there  was  not  without  its  uses,  for  in  the  Advocates' 
Library  Carlyle  found  books  which  had  a  great  effect 
upon  his  line  of  study.  He  collected  materials  for  his 
articles  upon  '  Cagliostro '  and  the  *  Diamond  Neck- 
lace.' At  the  end  of  four  months,  the  Carlyles  were 
back  again  at  Craigenputtock. 

August  was  a  bright  month  for  Thomas  Carlyle,  for 
it  was  then  that  Ralph  Waldo  Emerson  visited  him  at 
his  rural  retreat.  The  Carlyles  thought  him  '  one  of 
the  most  lovable  creatures'  they  had  ever  seen,  and 
an  unbroken  friendship  of  nearly  fifty  years  was  begun. 
As  winter  approached,'  Carlyle's  prospects  were  not 
very  bright,  and  he  once  more  turned  his  eyes  towards 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  41 

London,  where  the  remainder  of  his  life  was  to  be 
spent.  Before  following  him  thither,  it  may  be  well  to 
turn  from  the  outer  to  the  inner  side  of  Carlyle's  life, 
and  study  the  forces  which  went  to  the  making  of  his 
unique  personality. 


CHAPTER    III 

CARLYLE'S  MENTAL  DEVELOPMENT 

THROUGH  all  the  material  struggles  Carlyle's  mind  at 
Craigenputtock  was  gradually  shaping  itself  round  a 
theory  of  the  Universe  and  Man,  from  which  he  drew 
inspiration  in  his  future  life  work.  Through  his  con- 
tributions to  Magazines  and  Reviews  there  is  traceable 
an  original  vein  of  thought  and  feeling  which  had  its 
origin  in  the  study  of  German  literature.  Carlyle's 
studies  and  musings  took  coherent,  or,  as  some  would 
say  incoherent,  shape  in  Sartor  Resartus, — a  book 
which  appropriately  was  written  in  the  stern  solitude 
of  Craigenputtock. 

In  order  to  acquire  an  adequate  understanding  of 
Carlyle  as  a  thinker,  attention  has  to  be  paid  to  the 
two  dominating  influences  of  his  mental  life — his 
early  home  training  and  German  literature.  In  regard 
to  the  former,  ancestry  with  Carlyle  counts  for  much. 
He  came  of  a  sturdy  Covenanting  stock.  Carlyle 
himself  has  left  a  graphic  description  of  the  religious 
environment  of  the  Burghers,  to  which  sect  his  father 
belonged.  The  congregation,  under  the  ministry  of  a 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  43 

certain  John  Johnston,  who  taught  Carlyle  his  first 
Latin,  worshipped  in  a  little  house  thatched  with  heath. 
Of  the  simple  faith,  the  stern  piety  and  the  rugged 
heroism  of  the  old  Seceders,  Carlyle  himself  has  left  a 
photograph:  'Very  venerable  are  those  old  Seceder 
clergy  to  me  now  when  I  look  back.  .  .  .  Most  figures 
of  them  in  my  time  were  hoary  old  men ;  men  so  like 
evangelists  in  modern  vesture  and  poor  scholars  and 
gentlemen  of  Christ  I  have  nowhere  met  with  among 
Protestant  or  Papal  clergy  in  any  country  in  the  world. 
.  .  .  Strangely  vivid  are  some  twelve  or  twenty  of  those 
old  faces  whom  I  used  to  see  every  Sunday,  whose  names, 
employments  or  precise  dwellingplaces  I  never  knew, 
but  whose  portraits  are  yet  clear  to  me  as  in  a  mirror. 
Their  heavy-laden,  patient,  ever-attentive  faces,  fallen 
solitary  most  of  them,  children  all  away,  wife  away  for 
ever,  or,  it  might  be,  wife  still  there  and  constant  like 
a  shadow  and  grown  very  like  the  old  man,  the  thrifty 
cleanly  poverty  of  these  good  people,  their  well-saved 
coarse  old  clothes,  tailed  waistcoats  down  to  mid-thigh 
— all  this  I  occasionally  see  as  with  eyes  sixty  or  sixty- 
five  years  off,  and  hear  the  very  voice  of  my  mother 
upon  it,  whom  sometimes  I  would  be  questioning  about 
these  persons  of  the  drama  and  endeavouring  to 
describe  and  identify  them.'  And  what  a  glimpse  we 
have  into  the  inmost  heart  of  the  primitive  Covenanting 
religion  in  the  portrait  drawn  by  Carlyle  of  old  David 
Hope,  the  farmer  who  refused  to  postpone  family 


44  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

worship  in  order  to  take  in  his  grain.  David  was  put- 
ting on  his  spectacles  when  somebody  rushed  in  with 
the  words :  *  Such  a  raging  wind  risen  will  drive  the 
stooks  into  the  sea  if  let  alone.'  *  Wind  ! '  answered 
David,  'wind  canna  get  ae  straw  that  has  been  ap- 
pointed mine.  Sit  down  and  let  us  worship  God.' 
Far  away  from  the  simple  Covenanting  creed  of  his 
father  and  mother  Carlyle  wandered,  but  to  the  last 
the  feeling  of  life's  mystery  and  solemnity  remained 
vivid  with  him,  though  fed  from  quite  other  sources 
than  the  Bible  and  the  Shorter  Catechism. 

Much  has  been  said  of  Carlyle's  father,  but  it  is 
highly  probable  that  to  his  mother  he  owed  most 
during  his  early  years.  The  temperament  of  the 
Covenanter  was  of  the  non-conductor  type.  Men  like 
James  Carlyle  were  essentially  stern,  self-centred,  un- 
emotional. Fighting  like  the  Jews,  with  sword  in  one 
hand  and  trowel  in  the  other,  they  had  no  time  for 
cultivating  the  softer  side  of  human  nature.  Ready  to 
go  to  the  stake  on  behalf  of  religious  liberty,  they 
exercised  a  repressive,  not  to  say  despotic,  influence  in 
their  own  households.  With  them  education  meant 
not  the  unfolding  of  the  individual  powers  of  the 
children,  but  the  ruthless  crushing  of  them  into  a 
theological  mould.  Religion  in  such  an  atmosphere 
became  loveless  rather  than  lovely,  and  might  have 
had  serious  influences  of  a  reactionary  nature  but  for 
the  caressing  tenderness  of  the  mother.  With  a  heart 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  45 

which  overflowed  the  ordinary  theological  boundaries, 
the  mother  in  many  sweet  and  hidden  ways  supplied 
the  emotional  element,  which  had  been  crushed  out  of 
the  father  by  a  narrow  conception  of  life  and  duty. 
Carlyle's  experience  may  be  judged  from  his  references 
to  his  parents.  He  always  speaks  of  his  father  with 
profound  respect  and  admiration ;  towards  his  mother 
his  heart  goes  forth  with  a  devotion  which  became 
stronger  as  the  years  rolled  on.  Carlyle's  love  of  his 
mother  was  as  beautiful  as  it  was  sacred.  Long  after 
Carlyle  had  parted  with  the  creed  of  his  childhood,  his 
heart  tremulously  responded  to  the  old  symbols.  His 
system  of  thought,  indeed,  might  well  be  defined  as 
Calvinism  minus  Christianity.  Had  Carlyle  not  come 
into  contact  with  German  thought,  he  would  probably 
have  jogged  along  the  path  of  literature  in  more  or 
less  conventional  fashion.  In  fact,  nothing  is  more 
remarkable  than  the  comparatively  commonplace  nature 
of  Carlyle's  early  contributions  to  literature.  Germany 
touched  the  deepest  chords  of  his  nature.  With 
German  ideas  and  emotions  his  mind  was  saturated, 
and  Sartor  Resartus  was  the  outcome.  To  that  book 
students  must  go  for  a  glance  into  Carlyle's  mind  while 
he  was  wrestling  with  the  great  mysteries  of  Existence. 
In  June  1821,  as  Mr  Froude  tells  us,  took  place  what 
may  be  called  Carlyle's  conversion — his  triumph  over 
his  doubts,  and  the  beginning  of  a  new  life.  To 
understand  this  phase  of  Carlyle's  life,  we  must  pause 


4 6  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

for   a   little   to   consider   German   literature,    whence 
Carlyle  derived  spiritual  relief  and  consolation. 

What,  then,  was  the  nature  of  the  message  of  peace 
which  Germany,  through  Kant,  Fichte,  and  Goethe, 
brought  to  the  storm-tossed  soul  of  Carlyle?  When 
Carlyle  began  to  think  seriously,  two  antagonistic  con- 
ceptions of  life,  the  orthodox  and  the  rationalist,  were 
struggling  for  mastery  in  the  field  of  thought.  The 
orthodox  conception,  into  which  he  had  been  born, 
and  with  which  his  father  and  mother  had  fronted  the 
Eternities,  had  given  way  under  the  solvent  of  modern 
thought.  Carlyle's  belief  in  Christianity  as  a  revela- 
tion seems  to  have  dropped  from  him  without  much  of 
a  struggle,  somewhat  after  the  style  of  George  Eliot. 
His  mental  tortures  appear  to  have  arisen  from  spiritual 
hunger,  from  an  inability  to  fill  the  place  vacated  by 
the  old  beliefs.  Had  he  lived  fifty  years  earlier,  Carlyle 
would  have  been  invited  to  find  salvation  in  the  easy- 
going, drawing-room  rationalism  of  Hume  and  Gibbon, 
or  to  content  himself  with  the  ecclesiastical  placidity 
known  as  Moderatism. 

Much  had  occurred  since  the  arm-chair  philosophers 
of  Edinburgh  taught  that  this  was  the  best  possible 
world,  and  that  the  highest  wisdom  consisted  in  frown- 
ing upon  enthusiasm  and  cultivating  the  comfortable. 
The  French  Revolution  had  revolutionised  men's 
thoughts  and  feelings.  There  had  been  revealed  to 
man  the  inadequacy  of  the  old  Deistical  or  Mechanical 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  47 

philosophy,  which,  spreading  from  England  to  France, 
had  done  so  much  to  hasten  the  revolutionary  epoch. 
Carlyle  could  find  no  spiritual  sustenance  in  the  purely 
mechanical  theory  of  life  which  was  offered  as  the  sub- 
stitute for  the  theory  of  the  Churches.  There  was 
another  theory,  which  had  its  rise  in  Germany,  and  to 
which  Carlyle  clung  when  he  could  no  longer  keep 
hold  of  the  Supernatural.  In  Transcendentalism, 
Carlyle  found  salvation. 

What  are  the  leading  conceptions  of  the  German 
form  of  salvation  ?  The  answer  to  this  will  give  the 
key  to  Sartor  Resartus,  and  to  Carlyle's  whole  mental 
outlook.  In  the  eyes  of  thinkers  like  Carlyle,  the 
great  objection  to  Christianity  was  the  breach  it  made 
between  the  natural  and  the  supernatural.  Between 
them  there  was  a  great  gulf  which  could  only  fitfully  and 
temporarily  be  bridged  by  the  miraculous.  Students 
who  were  being  inoculated  with  scientific  ideas  of  law 
and  order,  were  bewildered  by  a  theory  of  life  which 
had  no  organic  relation  to  the  great  germinal  ideas  of 
the  day.  In  their  desire  to  abolish  the  supernatural, 
the  French  thinkers  constructed  a  theory  of  Nature  in 
which  everything,  from  the  movements  of  solar  masses 
to  the  movements  of  the  soul,  were  interpreted  in  terms 
of  matter.  By  adopting  a  mechanical  view  of  the 
Universe,  the  French  thinkers  robbed  Nature  of  much 
of  its  charm,  and  stunted  the  emotions  on  the  side  of 
wonder  and  admiration.  The  world  was  reduced  to  a 


48  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

vast  machine,  man  himself  being  simply  a  temporary 
embodiment  of  material  particles  in  a  highly  complex 
and  unique  form.  Instead  of  being  what  it  was  to 
the  Greeks,  a  temple  of  beauty,  the  Universe  to  the 
materialist  resembled  a  prison  in  which  the  walls  gradu- 
ally closed  upon  the  poor  wretch  till  he  was  crushed 
under  the  ruins.  Goethe  has  left  on  record  the  impres- 
sion made  upon  him  by  the  materialistic  view  of  life. 
As  he  says,  *  The  materialistic  theory,  which  reduces  all 
things  to  matter  and  motion,  appeared  to  me  so  grey, 
so  Cimmerian,  and  so  dead  that  we  shuddered  at  it  as 
at  a  ghost.' 

Sartor  Resartus  is  studded  with  vigorous  protests 
against  the  mechanical  view  of  Nature  and  Man.  Just 
as  distasteful  to  Carlyle,  and  equally  mechanical  in 
spirit,  was  the  Deistical  conception  of  Nature  as  a  huge 
clock,  under  the  superintendence  of  a  Divine  clock- 
maker,  whose  duty  consisted  in  seeing  that  the  clock 
kept  good  time  and  was  in  all  respects  thoroughly  re- 
liable. The  Germans  attacked  the  problem  from  the 
other  side.  They  did  not  abolish  the  supernatural 
with  the  materialists,  or  seek  it  in  another  world  with 
the  theologians;  they  found  the  supernatural  in  the 
natural.  To  the  materialists,  Kant,  Fichte,  Schelling, 
Hegel  and  Goethe  had  one  reply : — Reduce  matter  to 
jts  constituent  atoms,  they  argued,  and  you  never  seize 
the  principle  of  life ;  it  evades  you  like  a  spirit ;  in  this 
principle  everything  lives  and  moves  and  has  its  being. 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  49 

German  philosophy  from  Kant  has  been  occupied  in 
attempts  to  trace  the  spiritual  principle  in  the  great 
process  of  cosmic  evolution.  In  poetry,  Goethe 
attempted  to  represent  this  as  the  energising  principle 
of  life  and  duty.  The  spiritual  cannot  be  weighed  in 
the  scales  of  logic;  it  refuses  to  be  put  upon  the 
dissecting-table.  As  a  consequence,  the  truth  of  things 
is  best  seen  by  the  poet.  The  owl-like  logic-chopper, 
from  his  mechanical  and  utilitarian  standpoint,  sees  not 
the  Divine  vision.  This  has  been  called  Pantheism. 
Call  it  what  we  please,  it  is  contradictory  to  Deism  and 
Materialism,  and  is  the  root  thought  of  Sartor  Resartus, 
which  may  be  taken  as  Carlyle's  Confession  of  Faith. 
A  few  extracts  will  justify  the  foregoing  analysis.  The 
transcendental  view  of  Nature  is  expressed  by  Carlyle 
thus: — *  Atheistic  science  babbles  poorly  of  it  with 
scientific  nomenclature,  experiments  and  what  not,  as 
if  it  were  a  poor  dead  thing,  to  be  bottled  up  in  Leyden 
jars,  and  sold  over  counter;  but  the  native  sense  of 
man  in  all  times,  if  he  will  himself  apply  his  sense,  pro- 
claims it  to  be  a  living  thing — ah,  an  unspeakable,  God- 
like thing,  towards  which  the  best  attitude  for  us,  after 
never  so  much  science,  is  awe,  devout  prostration  and 
humility  of  soul,  worship,  if  not  in  words,  then  in 
silence.'  Here,  again,  is  a  passage  quite  Hegelian  in 
its  tone :  *  For  Matter,  were  it  never  so  despicable,  is 
Spirit ;  the  manifestation  of  Spirit,  were  it  never  so  hon- 
ourable, can  it  be  more  ?  The  thing  Visible,  nay,  the 


50  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

thing  Imagined,  the  thing  in  any  way  conceived  as 
Visible,  what  is  it  but  a  Garment,  a  Clothing  of  the 
higher  celestial  Invisible,  unimaginable,  formless,  dark 
with  excess  of  bright.' 

The  defects  of  Carlyle,  and  they  are  many,  take 
their  root  in  his  speculative  view  of  the  Universe — a 
view  which  demands  careful  analysis  if  the  student 
hopes  to  understand  Carlyle's  strength  and  weakness. 
It  is  not  meant  that  Carlyle's  mind  remained  anchored 
to  the  philosophic  idealism  of  Sartor.  In  later  days 
he  professed  contempt  for  transcendental  moonshine, 
but  his  contempt  was  for  the  form  and  jargon  of  the 
schools,  not  for  the  spirit,  which  dominated  Carlyle  to 
the  end.  After  Carlyle  passed  the  early  poetic  stage, 
his  views  took  more  and  more  an  anthropomorphic 
mould,  till  in  many  of  his  writings  he  seems  practically 
a  Theist.  But  at  root  Carlyle's  thought  was  more 
Pantheistical  than  Deistical.  What,  then,  is  the 
German  conception  of  the  Ultimate  Reality?  The 
German  answer  grew  out  of  an  attempt  to  get  rid 
of  the  difficulties  propounded  by  Hume.  Hume,  the 
father  of  all  the  Empiricists,  in  giving  logical  effect  to 
Berkeleyism,  concluded  that  just  as  we  know  nothing 
of  the  outer  world  beyond  sense  impressions,  so  of  the 
inner  world  of  mind  we  know  nothing  beyond  mental 
impressions.  We  can  combine  and  recombine  these 
impressions  as  we  choose,  but  from  them  we  cannot 
deduce  any  ultimate  laws,  either  of  the  world  or  of 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  51 

mind.  Hume  would  not  sanction  belief  in  causation 
as  a  universal  law.  All  that  could  be  said  was  that 
certain  things  happened  in  a  certain  manner  so  fre- 
quently as  to  give  rise  to  a  law  of  expectation.  But 
this  is  not  to  solve,  but  to  evade  the  problem  ?  We 
are  still  driven  to  ask,  What  is  matter?  What  is 
motion  ?  What  is  force  ?  How  do  we  get  our  know- 
ledge of  the  material  world,  and  is  that  knowledge 
reliable?  These  are  wide  questions  that  cannot  be 
adequately  handled  here.  It  was  a  favourite  argument 
of  Comte  and  his  followers,  that  man's  first  conceptions 
of  Nature  were  necessarily  erroneous,  because  they 
were  anthropomorphic.  Theology  was,  therefore, 
dethroned  without  ceremony.  But  science  is  as 
anthropomorphic  as  theology.  We  have  no  guarantee 
that  the  great  facts  of  Nature  are  as  we  think  them. 
We  talk  of  Force,  but  our  idea  of  Force  is  taken  from 
experiences  which  may  have  no  counterpart  in  Nature. 
It  is  well  known,  for  example,  that  the  secondary 
qualities  of  objects,  colour,  &c.,  do  not  exist  in 
Nature.  Our  personality  is  so  inextricably  mixed  with 
the  material  universe  that  it  is  impossible  to  formulate 
a  philosophy  like  Naturalism,  which  makes  mind  a 
product  of  Nature,  and  which  sharply  defines  the 
provinces  of  the  two. 

But  what  Naturalism  fails  to  do,  Idealism  or  Tran- 
scendentalism promises  to  perform.  Idealism  is  simply 
Materialism  turned  upside  down.  The  only  difference 


52  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

between  the  evolution  of  Spencer  and  of  Hegel  is  that 
the  one  puts  matter,  the  other  mind,  first.  For  all 
practical  purposes,  it  signifies  little  whether  mind  is 
the  temporary  embodiment  of  an  idea,  or  the  tem- 
porary product  of  a  highly  specialised  form  of  matter. 
In  either  case,  man  has  no  more  freedom  than  the 
bubble  upon  the  surface  of  the  stream.  We  may 
discourse  of  the  bubble  as  poetically  or  as  practically 
as  we  please,  the  result  is  the  same — absorption  in  the 
universal.  jHegelianism  as  much  as  Naturalism  leaves 
man  a  prisoner  in  the  hands  of  Fate.  The  only 
difference  is,  that  while  Naturalism  puts  round  the 
prisoner's  neck  a  plain,  unpretentious  noose,  Hegeli- 
anism  adds  fringes  and  embroidery.  If  there  is  no 
appeal  from  Nature's  dread  sentence,  the  less  poetry 
and  embroidery  there  is  about  the  doleful  business  the 
better. 

In  Sartor  Resartus^  Carlyle  talks  finely  but  vaguely, 
of  the  peace  which  came  over  his  soul  when  he  dis- 
covered that  the  universe  was  not  mechanical  but 
Divine.  The  peace  was  not  of  long  duration.  What 
consolation  Carlyle  derived  from  Idealism  did  not 
appear  in  his  life.  What  a  contrast  between  the  poetic 
optimism  of  Sartor  and  the  heavily-charged  pessimism 
of  old  age,  when  Carlyle,  with  wailing  pathos,  exclaims 
that  God  does  nothing.  Carlyle's  life  abundantly 
illustrates  the  fact  that  whenever  it  leaves  cloudland, 
Idealism  sinks  into  scepticism  more  bitter  and  gloomy 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  53 

than  the  unbelief  of  Naturalism.  Carlyle  approached 
the  question  of  the  Ultimate  Reality  from  the  wrong 
standpoint.  He  had  no  reasoned  philosophic  creed. 
A  poet,  he  had  the  poetic  dread  of  analysis,  and  his 
spirit  revolted  at  the  spectacle  of  Nature  on  the  dissect- 
ing-table.  He  waged  a  life-long  warfare  against  science. 
As  the  present  writer  has  elsewhere  remarked : — 
'  Carlyle  never  could  tolerate  the  evolution  theory. 
He  always  spoke  with  the  utmost  contempt  of  Darwin, 
and  everything  pertaining  to  the  development  doctrines. 
It  is  somewhat  startling  to  find  that  Carlyle  was  an 
evolutionist  without  knowing  it.  The  antagonism 
between  Carlyle  and  Spencer  disappears  on  closer 
inspection.  When  Carlyle  speaks  of  the  universe  as  in 
very  truth  the  star-domed  city  of  God,  and  reminds  us 
that  through  every  crystal  and  through  every  grass 
blade,  but  most  through  every  living  soul,  the  glory  of 
a  present  God  still  beams,  he  is  simply  saying  in  the 
language  of  poetry  what  Spencer  says  in  the  language 
of  science,  that  the  world  of  phenomena  is  sustained 
and  energised  by  an  infinite  Eternal  Power.  Evolution 
is  as  emphatic  as  Carlyle  on  the  absolute  distinction 
between  right  and  wrong.  Carlyle  and  all  the 
German  school  confront  the  evolutionary  ethics  with  the 
Kantian  categorical  imperative.  Surely  the  Evolution- 
ists in  the  matter  of  an  imperative  out-rival  the  Intui- 
tionalists,  when,  in  addition  to  the  dictates  of  con- 
science, they  can  call  as  a  witness  and  sanction  to 


54  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

morality  the  testimony  of  all-embracing  experience. 
In  his  famous  saying,  Might  is  Right,  Carlyle  was 
unconsciously  formulating  one  aspect  of  evolutionary 
ethics.  Carlyle  did  not  mean  anything  so  silly  as 
that  brute  force  and  ethical  sanctions  are  identical ; 
what  he  meant  was  that  in  the  long  run  Righteousness 
will  prove  the  mightiest  force  in  the  universe.  What  is 
this  but  another  version  of  the  Spencerian  doctrine  of 
the  survival  of  the  fittest,  which,  in  the  most  highly 
evolved  state  of  society,  will  mean  the  survival  of  the 
best?  In  the  highest  social  state  the  only  Might 
that  will  survive  will  be  the  Might  which  is  rooted  in 
Right.  Carlyle's  contemptuous  attitude  towards 
science  is  deeply  to  be  deplored.  He  waged  bitter 
warfare  against  the  evolution  theory,  quite  oblivious 
of  the  fact  that  by  means  of  it  there  was  revealed 
a  deeper  insight  into  the  Power  behind  Nature,  and 
into  the  ethical  constitution  of  the  universe,  than  ever 
entered  into  the  minds  of  transcendental  philoso- 
ohers.' 

It  is  taken  for  granted  that  Carlyle's  thoughts  have 
no  organic  unity.  He  is  looked  upon  as  a  stimulat- 
ing, but  confused,  writer,  as  a  thinker  of  original,  but 
incoherent,  power.  True,  he  has  not  a  logical  mind, 
and  pays  no  deference  to  the  canons  of  the  schools  or 
the  market-place.  But  there  is  a  method  in  Carlyle's 
apparent  caprice.  When  analysed,  his  thoughts  are 
discovered  to  have  unity.  His  transcendentalism  em- 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  55 

braces  the  ethic  as  well  as  the  cosmic  side  of  life.  In 
the  sphere  of  morals,  as  of  science,  his  writings  are  one 
long  tumultuous  protest  against  the  mechanical  philo- 
sophy and  the  utilitarian  theory  of  morals.  From 
his  essay  on  Voltaire  we  take  the  following : — '  It  is 
contended  by  many  that  our  mere  love  of  personal 
Pleasure  or  Happiness,  as  it  is  called,  acting  in  every 
individual  with  such  clearness  as  he  may  easily  have, 
will  of  itself  lead  him  to  respect  the  rights  of  others, 
and  wisely  employ  his  own.  .  .  .  Without  some  belief 
in  the  necessary  eternal,  or,  which  is  the  same  thing, 
in  the  supra  mundane  divine  nature  of  Virtue  exist- 
ing in  each  individual,  could  the  moral  judgment  of 
a  thousand  or  a  thousand  thousand  individuals  avail 
us'?  More  picturesquely,  Carlyle  denounces  the 
utilitarian  system  in  these  words  :  *  What  then  ?  Is 
the  heroic  inspiration  we  name  Virtue  but  some 
passion,  some  bubble  of  the  blood,  bubbling  in  the 
direction  others  profit  by  ?  I  know  not ;  only  this  I 
know.  If  what  thou  namest  Happiness  be  our  true 
aim,  then  are  we  all  astray.  With  Stupidity  and  sound 
Digestion,  man  may  front  much.  But  what  in  these 
dull,  unimaginative  days  are  the  terrors  of  conscience 
to  the  diseases  of  the  Liver?  Not  on  Morality,  but 
on  Cookery,  let  us  build  our  stronghold :  there, 
brandishing  our  frying-pan  as  censer,  let  us  offer  sweet 
incense  to  the  Devil,  and  live  at  ease  on  the  fat  things 
he  has  provided  for  his  Elect ' !  The  exponent  of  such 


56  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

a  theory  of  ethics  will  have  a  natural  distaste  for  the 
rational  or  calculating  side  of  conduct.  He  will  de- 
preciate the  mechanical,  and  give  undue  emphasis  to 
the  inspirational.  His  heroes  will  be  not  men  of  placid 
temperament,  methodical  habits,  and  utilitarian  aims, 
but  men  of  mystical  and  passionate  natures,  spasmodic 
in  action,  and  guided  by  ideas  not  easily  justified  at 
the  bar  of  utility. 

Just  as  in  the  sphere  of  speculative  thought,  he  has 
profound  contempt  for  the  Diderots  and  Voltaires,  with 
their  mechanical  views  of  the  Universe,  so  in  practical 
affairs  Carlyle  has  contempt  for  the  men  who  endea- 
vour to  further  their  aims  by  appealing  to  common- 
place motives  by  means  of  commonplace  methods. 
Specially  opposed  is  he  to  the  tendency  of  the  age 
to  rely  for  progress,  not  upon  appeals  to  the  great 
elemental  forces  of  human  nature,  but  upon  organisa- 
tions, committees,  and  all  kinds  of  mechanism.  In  his 
remarkable  essay,  '  Signs  of  the  Times,'  we  have  ample 
verification  of  our  exposition.  After  talking  depreciat- 
ingly of  the  mechanical  tendency  of  the  prevailing 
philosophies,  Carlyle  comments  upon  the  mechanical 
nature  of  the  reforming  agencies  of  civilisation.  The 
intense  Egoism  of  his  nature  rebels  against  any  kind  of 
Socialism  or  Collectivism.  He  says :  '  Were  we  re- 
quired to  characterise  this  age  of  ours  by  any  single 
epithet,  we  should  be  tempte,d  to  call  it,  not  a  Heroical, 
Pevotional,  Philosophical,  or  Heroic  Age,  but,  above 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  57 

all,  the  Mechanical  Age.     It  is  the  age  of  machinery 
in  every  outward  and  inward  sense  of  that  word.  .  .  . 
Men  are  grown  mechanical  in  head  and  heart,  as  well 
as  in  hand.     They  have  lost  faith  in  individual  en- 
deavour, and  in  natural  force  of  any  kind.  .  .  .  We 
may  trace  this  tendency  in  all  the  great  manifestations 
of  our  time:  in  its  intellectual  aspect,  the  studies  it 
most  favours,  and  its  manner  of  conducting  them ;  in 
its  practical  aspects,  its  politics,  art,  religious  work ; 
in  the  whole  sources,  and  throughout  the  whole  current 
of  its   spiritual,   no   less  than   its   material,  activity.' 
With  Carlyle  the  secrets  of  Nature  and  Life  were  dis- 
coverable, not  so  much  by  the  intellect  as  by  the  heart. 
The  man  with  the  large  heart,  rather  than  the  clear 
head,  saw  furthest  into  the  nature  of  things.     The 
history  of  German  thought  is  strewn  with  the  wreck  of 
systems  based  upon  the  Carlylian  doctrine  of  intuition. 
Schelling  and  Hegel  showed  the  puerility  to  which  great 
men  are  driven  when  they  started  to  construct  science 
out  of  their  own  intuitions,  instead  of  patiently  and 
humbly  sitting  down  to  study  Nature.    Tyndall  has  left 
on  record  his  gratitude  to  Carlyle.     Tyndall  had  grip 
of  the  scientific  method,  and  was  able  to  allow  Carlyle's 
inspiration  to  play  upon  his  mind  without  fear  of  harm ; 
but  how  many  waverers  has  Carlyle  driven  from  the 
path  of  reason  into  the  bogs  of  mysticism  ? 

Carlyle's  impatience  with  reasoning  and  his  deter- 
mination to  follow  the  promptings  of  a  priori  concep- 


58  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

tions  gave  his  system  of  ethics  a  one-sided  cast,  and 
made  him  needlessly  aggressive  towards  what  in  his 
day  was  called  Utilitarianism,  but  what  has  now  come 
to  be  known  as  Evolutionary  Ethics.  What  is  the 
chief  end  of  man  considered  as  a  moral  agent  ?  The 
answer  of  the  Christian  religion  is  as  intelligible  as  it 
is  comprehensive.  Man's  duty  consists  in  obeying  the 
laws  of  God  revealed  in  Nature  and  in  the  Bible.  But 
apart  from  revelation,  where  is  the  basis  of  ethical 
authority?  Debarred  from  accepting  the  Christian 
view,  and  instinctively  repelled  from  Utilitarianism, 
Carlyle  found  refuge  in  the  Fichtean  and  similar  sys- 
tems of  ethics.  By  substituting  Blessedness  for  Happi- 
ness as  the  aim  of  ethical  endeavour,  Carlyle  en- 
deavoured to  preserve  the  heroic  attitude  which  was 
associated  with  Supernaturalism.  In  his  view,  it  was 
more  consistent  with  human  dignity  to  trust  for  in- 
spiration to  a  light  within  than  painfully  to  piece  to- 
gether fragments  of  human  experience  and  ponder  the 
inferences  to  be  drawn  therefrom. 

In  his  '  Data  of  Ethics/  Herbert  Spencer  shows  the 
hollowness  of  Carlyle's  distinction  between  Blessedness 
and  Happiness.  As  Spencer  puts  it :  '  Obviously  the 
implication  is  that  Blessedness  is  not  a  kind  of  Happi- 
ness, and  this  implication  at  once  suggests  the  question, 
What  mode  of  feeling  is  this  ?  If  it  is  a  state  of  con- 
sciousness at  all,  it  is  necessarily  one  of  three  states — 
painful,  indifferent,  or  pleasurable If  the  plea- 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  59 

surable  states  are  in  excess,  then  the  blessed  life  can  be 
distinguished  from  any  other  pleasurable  life  only  by 
the  relative  amount  or  the  quality  of  its  pleasures.  It 
is  a  life  which  makes  happiness  of  a  certain  kind  and 
degree  its  end,  and  the  assumption  that  blessedness  is 

not   a   form  of  happiness   lapses In   brief, 

blessedness  has  for  its  necessary  condition  of  existence 
increased  happiness,  positive  or  negative  in  some  con- 
sciousness or  other ;  and  disappears  utterly  if  we  assume 
that  the  actions  called  blessed  are  known  to  cause  de- 
crease of  happiness  in  others  as  well  as  in  the  actor.' 

To  German  philosophy  and  literature  Carlyle  owed 
his  critical  method,  by  which  he  all  but  revolutionised 
criticism  as  understood  by  his  Edinburgh  and  London 
contemporaries.  Carlyle  began  his  apprenticeship  with 
the  Edinburgh  Reviewers,  in  whose  hand  criticism 
never  lost  its  political  bias.  Apart  from  that,  criticism 
up  till  the  time  of  Carlyle  was  mainly  statical.  The 
critic  was  a  kind  of  literary  book-keeper  who  went  upon 
the  double-entry  system.  On  one  page  were  noted  ex- 
cellences, on  the  other  defects,  and  when  the  two 
columns  were  totalled  the  debtor  and  creditor  side  of 
the  transaction  was  set  forth.  Where,  as  in  the  cases 
of  Burns  and  Byron,  genius  was  complicated  with 
moral  aberration,  anything  like  a  correct  estimate  was 
impossible.  The  result  was  that  in  Scotland  criticism 
oscillated  between  the  ethical  severity  of  the  pulpit  and 
the  daring  laxity  of  free  thought.  As  the  Edinburgh 


60  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

Reviewers  could  not  afford  to  set  the  clergy  at  defi- 
ance, they  had  to  pay  due  respect  to  conventional 
tastes  and  standards.  Carlyle  faced  the  question  from 
a  different  standpoint.  He  introduced  into  criticism 
the  dynamic  principle  which  he  found  in  the  Germans, 
particularly  in  Goethe.  In  contemplating  a  work  of 
Art,  the  Germans  talk  much  of  the  importance  of 
seizing  upon  the  creative  spirit,  what  Hegel  called  the 
Idea.  The  thought  of  Goethe  and  Hegel,  though 
differently  expressed,  resolves  itself  into  the  concep- 
tion of  a  life  principle  which  shapes  materials  into 
harmony  with  innate  forms.  In  the  sphere  of  life  the 
determining  factors  are  the  inner  vitalities,  which,  how- 
ever, are  susceptible  to  the  environment.  The  critic 
who  would  realise  his  ideal  does  not  go  about  with 
literary  and  ethical  tape-lines :  he  seeks  to  understand 
the  spirit  which  animated  the  author  as  shewn  in  his 
works  and  his  life,  and  then  studies  the  influence  of  his 
environment.  That  this  is  a  correct  description  of 
Carlyle's  critical  method  is  evidenced  by  his  own  re- 
marks in  his  essay  on  Burns.  He  says :  '  If  an  in- 
dividual is  really  of  consequence  enough  to  have  his 
life  and  character  recorded  for  public  remembrance, 
we  have  always  been  of  opinion  that  the  public  ought 
to  be  made  acquainted  with  all  the  springs  and  rela- 
tions of  his  character.  How  did  the  world  and  man's 
life  from  his  particular  position  represent  themselves 
to  his  mind?  How  did  co- existing  circumstances 


THOMAS   CARLYLE  61 

modify  him  from  without :  how  did  he  modify  these 
from  within?' 

This  attention  to  the  inner  springs  of  character  gives 
the  key  to  Carlyle's  critical  work.  How  fruitful  this 
was  is  seen  in  his  essay  on  Burns.  He  steered  an 
even  course  between  the  stern  moralists,  whose  indig- 
nation at  the  sins  of  Burns  the  man  blinded  them  to 
the  genius  of  Burns  the  poet,  and  the  flippant  Bohemi- 
ans, who  thought  that  by  bidding  defiance  to  the  con- 
ventionalities and  moralities  Burns  proved  his  title  to 
the  name  of  genius,  and  whose  voices  are  yet  unduly 
with  us  in  much  spirituous  devotion  and  rhymeless 
doggerel  at  the  return  of  each  25th  of  January.  While 
laying  bare  the  springs  of  Burns'  genius,  Carlyle,  with 
unerring  precision,  also  puts  his  finger  on  the  weak 
point  in  the  poet's  moral  nature.  So  faithfully  did 
Carlyle  apply  his  critical  method  that  he  may 
be  considered  to  have  said  the  final  word  about 
Burns. 

When  Goethe  spoke  of  Carlyle  as  a  great  moral 
force  he  must  have  had  in  his  mind  the  ethical  tone 
of  Carlyle's  critical  writing — a  tone  which  had  its  roots 
in  the  idea  that  judgment  upon  a  man  should  be  deter- 
mined, not  by  isolated  deviations  from  conventional  or 
even  ethical  standards,  but  by  consideration  of  the 
deep  springs  of  character  from  which  flow  aspirations 
and  ideals.  In  his  Heroes  and  Hero-  Worship  Carlyle 
elaborates  his  critical  theory  thus  :  '  On  the  whole,  we 


62  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

make  too  much  of  faults ;  the  details  of  the  business 
hide  the  real  centre  of  it.  Faults?  The  greatest  of 
faults,  I  should  say,  is  to  be  conscious  of  none. 
Readers  of  the  Bible  above  all,  one  would  think, 
might  know  better.  Who  is  called  there  "the  man 
according  to  God's  own  heart  ?  "  David,  the  Hebrew 
King,  had  fallen  into  sins  enough — blackest  crimes — 
there  was  no  want  of  sins.  And  thereupon  the  un- 
believers sneer  and  ask:  Is  this  your  man  according 
to  God's  heart  ?  The  sneer,  I  must  say,  seems  to  me 
but  a  shallow  one.  What  are  faults  ?  What  are  the 
outward  details  of  a  life,  if  the  inner  secret  of  it, 
the  remorse,  temptations,  true,  often-baffled,  never- 
ended  struggle  of  it,  be  forgotten?  ....  The  dead- 
liest sin,  I  say,  were  that  same  supercilious  con- 
sciousness of  no  sin :  that  is  death.  ....  David's 
life  and  history,  as  written  for  us  in  those  Psalms 
of  his,  I  consider  to  be  the  truest  emblem  ever 
given  of  a  man's  moral  progress  and  warfare  here 
below.' 

This  canon  faithfully  applied  enabled  Carlyle  to  in- 
vest with  a  new  and  living  interest  large  sections  of 
literary  criticism.  Burns,  Johnson,  Cromwell  and 
others  of  like  calibre,  were  rescued  by  Carlyle  from  the 
hands  of  Pedants  and  Pharisees.  To  readers  wearied 
with  the  facile  criticism  of  conventional  reviewers,  it 
was  a  revelation  to  come  into  contact  with  a 
writer  like  Carlyle,  who  not  only  gave  to  the  mind 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  63 

great  inspirational  impetus,  but  also  a  larger  critical 
outlook;  it  was  like  stepping  out  of  a  museum,  or 
a  dissecting-room  into  the  free,  fresh,  breezy  air  of 
Nature. 

Moreover,  Carlyle's  interest  in  the  soul  is  not  of  an 
antiquarian  nature;  he  studies  his  heroes  as  if  they 
were  ancestors  of  the  Carlyle  family.  He  broods  over 
their  letters  as  if  they  were  the  letters  of  his  own  flesh 
and  blood,  and  his  comments  resemble  the  soliloquis- 
ings  of  a  pathos  stricken  kinsman  rather  than  the 
conscious  reflections  of  a  literary  man.  It  is  note- 
worthy that  Carlyle's  critical  powers  are  limited  by  his 
sympathies.  His  method,  though  suggestive  of  scien- 
tific criticism,  is  largely  influenced  by  the  personal 
equation.  Face  to  face  with  writers  like  Scott  and 
Voltaire,  he  flounders  in  helpless  incompetency.  He 
tries  Scott,  the  writer  of  novels,  by  purely  Puritan 
standards.  Because  there  is  in  Scott  no  signs  of  soul- 
struggles,  no  conscious  devotion  to  heroic  ends,  no 
introspective  torturings,  Carlyle  sets  himself  to  a  pro- 
cess of  belittling.  So  with  Voltaire.  Carlyle's  failure 
in  this  sphere  was  due  to  the  fact  that  he  overdid  the 
ethical  side  of  criticism  and  became  a  pulpiteer ;  he 
was  false  to  his  own  principle  of  endeavouring  to  seize 
the  dominant  idea.  Because  Scott  and  Voltaire  were 
not  dominated  by  the  Covenanting  idea,  Carlyle  dealt 
with  them  in  a  tone  of  disparagement.  Carlyle  admired 
Goethe,  but  he  certainly  made  no  attempt  to  cultivate 


64  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

Goethe's  catholicity.  Let  us  not  fall  into  Carlyle's 
mistake,  and  condemn  him  for  qualities  which  were 
incompatible  with  his  temperament.  After  all  has 
been  said,  English  literature  stands  largely  indebted 
to  Carlyle  the  critic. 


CHAPTER    IV 

LIFE    IN    LONDON 

MRS  CARLYLE  entered  heartily  into  her  husband's  pro- 
posal to  remove  to  London.  '  Burn  our  ships  ! '  she 
gaily  said  to  him  one  day  (/.*.,  dismantle  our  house) ; 
'  carry  all  our  furniture  with  us ' ;  which  they  accord- 
ingly did.  '  At  sight  of  London/  Carlyle  wrote,  '  I 
remember  humming  to  myself  a  ballad-stanza  of 
"Johnnie  o'  Braidislea,"  which  my  dear  old  mother 
used  to  sing, 

"  For  there's  seven  foresters  in  yon  forest ; 

And  them  I  want  to  see,  see, 
And  them  I  want  to  see  (and  shoot  down) ! " 

Carlyle  lodged  at  Ampton  Street  again;  but  pre- 
sently did  '  immense  stretches  of  walking  in  search  of 
houses.'  He  found  his  way  to  Chelsea  and  there 
secured  a  small  old-fashioned  house  at  5  (now  num- 
bered 24)  Cheyne  Row,  at  a  rent  of  ^35  a  year. 
Mrs  Carlyle  followed  in  a  short  time  and  approved  of 
his  choice.  They  took  possession  on  the  loth  June 
1834,  and  Carlyle  recounts  the  'cheerful  gipsy  life' 
they  had  there  'among  the  litter  and  carpenters  for 
three  incipient  days.'  Leigh  Hunt  was  in  the  next 

I  E  65 


66  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

street  'sending  kind,  ^practical  messages/  dropping 
in  to  see  them  in  the  evenings. 

When  in  London  on  a  former  occasion,  Carlyle  be- 
came acquainted  with  John  Stuart  Mill,  and  the 
intimacy  was  kept  alive  by  correspondence  to  and 
from  Craigenputtock.  It  was  through  Mill's  letters 
that  Carlyle's  thoughts  were  turned  towards  the  French 
Revolution.  When  he  returned  to  London,  Mill  was 
very  useful  to  him,  lending  him  a  fine  collection  of 
books  on  that  subject.  Mill's  evenings  in  Cheyne  Row 
were  '  sensibly  agreeable  for  most  part,'  remarks  Car- 
lyle. 'Talk  rather  wintry  (" sawdustish,"  as  old 
Sterling  once  called  it),  but  always  well-informed  and 
sincere.'  Carlyle  was  making  rapid  progress  with  the 
first  volume  of  his  French  Revolution.  Stern  necessity 
gave  a  spurt  to  his  pen,  for  in  February  1835  ^e  notes 
that  '  some  twenty-three  months  '  had  passed  since  he 
earned  a  single  penny  by  the  '  craft  of  literature.'  The 
volume  was  completed  and  he  lent  the  only  copy  to 
Mill.  The  MS.  was  unfortunately  burnt  by  a  ser- 
vant-maid. 'How  well  do  I  still  remember,'  writes 
Carlyle  in  his  Reminiscences,  '  that  night  when  he  came 
to  tell  us,  pale  as  Hector's  ghost.  ...  It  was  like  half 
sentence  of  death  to  us  both,  and  we  had  to  pretend  to 
take  it  lightly,  so  dismal  and  ghastly  was  his  horror  at 
it,  and  try  to  talk  of  other  matters.  He  stayed  three 
mortal  hours  or  so ;  his  departure  quite  a  relief  to  us. 
Oh,  the  burst  of  sympathy  my  poor  darling  then  gave 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  67 

me,  flinging  her  arms  round  my  neck,  and  openly 
lamenting,  condoling,  and  encouraging  like  a  nobler 
second  self!  Under  heaven  is  nothing  beautifuller. 
We  sat  talking  till  late;  'shall  be  written  again,' my 
fixed  word  and  resolution  to  her.  Which  proved  to  be 
such  a  task  as  I  never  tried  before  or  since.  I  wrote 
out  "Feast  of  Pikes"  (Vol.  II.),  and  then  went  at  it. 
Found  it  fairly  impossible  for  about  a  fortnight ;  passed 
three  weeks  (reading  Marryat's  novels),  tried,  cautious- 
cautiously,  as  on  ice  paper-thin,  once  more ;  and  in 
short  had  a  job  more  like  breaking  my  heart  than  any 
other  in  my  experience.  Jeannie,  alone  of  beings, 
burnt  like  a  steady  lamp  beside  me.  I  forget  how 
much  of  money  we  still  had.  I  think  there  was  at  first 
something  like  .£300,  perhaps  ^"280,  to  front  London 
with.  Nor  can  I  in  the  least  remember  where  we  had 
gathered  such  a  sum,  except  that  it  was  our  own,  no 
part  of  it  borrowed  or  given  us  by  anybody.  "  Fit  to 
last  till  French  Revolution  is  ready  !  "  and  she  had  no 
misgivings  at  all.  Mill  was  penitently  liberal ;  sent 
me  ^200  (in  a  day  or  two),  of  which  I  kept  ^100 
(actual  cost  of  house  while  I  had  written  burnt  volume) ; 
upon  which  he  bought  me  "  Biographic  Universelle," 
which  I  got  bound,  and  still  have.  Wish  I  could  find 
a  way  of  getting  the  now  much  macerated,  changed, 
and  fanaticised  John  Stuart  Mill  to  take  that  ;£ioo 
back  ;  but  I  fear  there  is  no  way/  * 

*  Reminiscences  t  vol.  ii.  pp.  178-79. 


68  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

Carlyle  went  diligently  to  work  at  the  French  Revolu- 
tion. Some  conviction  he  had  that  the  book  was  worth 
something.  Once  or  twice  among  the  flood  of  equipages 
at  Hyde  Park  Corner,  when  taking  his  afternoon  stroll, 
he  thought  to  himself,  '  Perhaps  none  of  you  could  do 
what  I  am  at ! '  But  generally  his  feeling  was,  *  I  will 
finish  this  book,  throw  it  at  your  feet,  buy  a  rifle  and 
spade,  and  withdraw  to  the  Transatlantic  Wildernesses, 
far  from  human  beggaries  and  basenesses  ! '  '  This,' 
he  says,  '  had  a  kind  of  comfort  to  me ;  yet  I  always 
knew  too,  in  the  background,  that  this  would  not  prac- 
tically do.  In  short,  my  nervous  system  had  got  dread- 
fully irritated  and  inflamed  before  I  quite  ended,  and 
my  desire  was  intense,  beyond  words,  to  have  done 
with  it.'  Then  he  adds :  c  The  last  paragraph  I  well 
remember  writing  upstairs  in  the  drawing-room  that 
now  is,  which  was  then  my  writing-room ;  beside  her 
there  in  a  grey  evening  (summer,  I  suppose),  soon 
after  tea  (perhaps) ;  and  thereupon,  with  her  dear  bless- 
ing on  me,  going  out  to  walk.  I  had  said  before  going 
out,  "What  they  will  do  with  this  book,  none  knows, 
my  Jeannie,  lass;  but  they  have  not  had,  for  a  two 
hundred  years,  any  book  that  came  more  truly  from  a 
man's  very  heart,  and  so  let  them  trample  it  under  foot 
and  hoof  as  they  see  best ! "  "  Pooh,  pooh  !  they  can- 
not trample  that ! "  she  would  cheerily  answer;  for  her 
own  approval  (I  think  she  had  read  always  regularly 
behind  me)  especially  in  Vol.  III.,  was  strong  and 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  69 

decided/     Mrs  Carlyle  was  right.     No  critic  or  clique 
of  critics  could  trample  the  French  Revolution. 

A  month  before  the  completion  of  the  first  book  of 
the  French  Revolution,  Carlyle  wrote  in  his  journal : 
'  My  first  friend  Edward  Irving  is  dead.  I  am  friend- 
less here  or  as  good  as  that.'  In  a  week  or  two  there- 
after he  met  Southey,  whom  he  describes  as  a  '  lean, 
grey  -  white-headed  man  of  dusky  complexion,  unex- 
pectedly tall  when  he  rises  and  still  leaner  then — the 
shallowest  chin,  prominent  snubbed  Roman  nose,  small 
carelined  brow,  huge  brush  of  white-grey-hair  on  high 
crown  and  projecting  on  all  sides,  the  most  vehement 
pair  of  faint  hazel  eyes  I  have  ever  seen — a  well-read, 
honest,  limited  (straitlaced  even),  kindly-hearted,  most 
irritable  man.  We  parted  kindly,  with  no  great  purpose 
on  either  side,  I  imagine,  to  meet  again.'*  Later  on 
Carlyle  admits  to  his  brother  John  that  his  prospects 
in  London  were  not  brightening ;  which  fact  left  him 
gloomy  and  morose. 

During  his  enforced  leisure  after  the  destruction  of 
the  first  book  of  the  French  Revolution,  Carlyle  saw 
more  of  his  friends,  among  whom  he  numbered  John 
Sterling,  fresh  from  Cambridge  and  newly  ordained 
a  clergyman.  Sterling  was  of  a  'vehement  but  most 
noble  nature,'  and  he  was  one  of  the  few  who  had 
studied  Sartor  Resartus  seriously.  He  had  been  also 
caught  by  the  Radical  epidemic  on  the  spiritual  side. 
*  Froude's  '  Life  in  London,'  vol.  i.  p.  20. 


70  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

Although  dissenting  from  much  of  what  Carlyle 
taught,  Sterling  recognised  in  him  'a  man  not  only 
brilliantly  gifted,  but  differing  from  the  common  run  of 
people  in  this,  that  he  would  not  lie,  that  he  would  not 
equivocate,  that  he  would  say  always  what  he  actually 
thought,  careless  whether  he  pleased  or  offended.'  He 
introduced  Carlyle  to  his  father,  who  was  then  the 
1  guiding  genius '  of  the  Times,  and  who  offered  Carlyle 
work  there  on  the  usual  conditions.  *  Carlyle/  says 
Froude,  '  though  with  poverty  at  his  door,  and  entire 
penury  visible  in  the  near  future,  turned  away  from  a 
proposal  which  might  have  tempted  men  who  had  less 
excuse  for  yielding  to  it.  He  was  already  the  sworn 
soldier  of  another  chief.  His  allegiance  from  first  to 
last  was  to  truth,  truth  as  it  presented  itself  to  his  own 
intellect  and  his  own  conscience.' 

On  the  1 6th  of  February  1835  Carlyle  wrote  to  his 
brother  John  :  '  I  positively  do  not  care  that  periodical 
literature  shuts  her  fist  against  me  in  these  months. 
Let  her  keep  it  shut  for  ever,  and  go  to  the  devil, 
which  she  mostly  belongs  to.  The  matter  had  better 
be  brought  to  a  crisis.  There  is  perhaps  a  finger  of 
Providence  in  it.  ...  My  only  new  scheme,  since  last 
letter,  is  a  hypothesis — little  more  yet — about  National 
Education.  The  newspapers  had  an  advertisement 
about  a  Glasgow  "  Educational  Association "  which 
wants  a  man  that  would  found  a  Normal  School,  first 
going  over  England  and  into  Germany  to  get  light  on 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  71 

that  matter.  I  wrote  to  that  Glasgow  Association  afar 
off,  enquiring  who  they  were,  what  manner  of  man  they 
expected,  testifying  myself  very  friendly  to  their  project, 
and  so  forth — no  answer  as  yet.  It  is  likely  they 
will  want,  as  Jane  says,  a  "  Chalmers  and  Welsh  "  kind 
of  character,  in  which  case  Va  ben,  felice  notte.  If  other- 
wise, and  they  (almost  by  miracle)  had  the  heart,  I  am 
the  man  for  them.  Perhaps  my  name  is  so  heterodox 
in  that  circle,  I  shall  not  hear  at  all.'  *  Carlyle  also 
remarks,  in  the  same  letter,  that  John  Stuart  Mill  is 
very  friendly :  '  He  is  the  nearest  approach  to  a  real 
man  that  I  find  here — nay,  as  far  as  negativeness  goes, 
he  is  that  man,  but  unhappily  not  very  satisfactory 
much  farther.' 

Not  long  thereafter  Carlyle  met  Wordsworth.  *  I 
did  not  expect  much,'  he  said  in  a  letter,  '  but  got 
mostly  what  I  expected.  The  old  man  has  a  fine 
shrewdness  and  naturalness  in  his  expression  of  face,  a 
long  Cumberland  figure ;  one  finds  also  a  kind  of 
sincerity  in  his  speech.  But  for  prolixity,  thinness, 
endless  dilution,  it  excels  all  the  other  speech  I  had 
heard  from  mortals.  A  genuine  man,  which  is  much, 
but  also  essentially  a  small,  genuine  man.' 

Early  in  October  1835  Carlyle  started  for  his  old 
home.  His  mother-in-law  had  arrived  on  a  visit  at 
Cheyne  Row,  and  remained  there  with  her  daughter 
during  Carlyle's  absence  in  Scotland.  He  returned 

*  Froude's  '  Life  in  London,'  vol.  i.  p.  24. 


72  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

improved  in  health  and  spirits.  Nothing  came  of  the 
National  Education  scheme.  Carlyle  was  not  a  person 
to  push  himself  into  notice,  remarks  Froude ;  and  his 
friends  did  not  exert  themselves  for  him,  or  they  tried 
and  failed ;  '  governments,  in  fact,  do  not  look  out  for 
servants  among  men  who  are  speculating  about  the 
nature  of  the  Universe.  Then,  as  always,  the  doors 
leading  into  regular  employment  remained  closed.' 
Shortly  after  his  return  from  the  North,  he  was  offered 
the  editorship  of  a  newspaper  at  Lichfield.  This  was 
unaccepted  for  the  same  reason  that  weighed  with  him 
when  he  refused  a  post  on  the  Times.  In  the  follow- 
ing summer  money  matters  had  become  so  pressing 
that  Carlyle  wrote  the  article  on.Mirabeau,  now  printed 
among  the  Miscellanies,  for  Mill's  review,  which  brought 
him  £$o.  Mrs  Carlyle's  health  began  to  suffer,  and  a 
visit  to  Annandale  became  imperative.  She  returned 
'  mended  in  spirits.'  Writing  of  her  arrival  in  London, 
she  said :  '  I  had  my  luggage  put  on  the  backs  of  two 
porters,  and  walked  on  to  Cheapside,  when  I  presently 
found  a  Chelsea  omnibus.  By-and-bye  the  omnibus 
stopped,  and  amid  cries  of  "  No  room,  sir ;  can't  get 
in,"  Carlyle's  face,  beautifully  set  off  by  a  broad- 
brimmed  white  hat,  gazed  in  at  the  door  like  the 
peri  "  who,  at  the  gate  of  heaven,  stood  disconsolate." 
In  hurrying  along  the  Strand,  his  eye  had  lighted 
on  my  trunk  packed  on  the  top  of  the  omnibus,  and 
had  recognised  it.  This  seems  to  me  one  of  the 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  73 

most  indubitable  proofs  of  genius  which  he  ever 
manifested.' 

On  the  22nd  of  January  1837  Carlyle  wrote  to  his 
mother :  *  The  book  {French  Revolution]  is  actually 
done ;  all  written  to  the  last  line ;  and  now,  after 
much  higgling  and  maffling,  the  printers  have  got 
fairly  afloat,  and  we  are  to  go  on  with  the  wind  and 
the  sea.'  But  no  money  could  be  expected  from  the 
book  for  a  considerable  time.  Meanwhile,  Miss 
Harriet  Martineau  (who  had  introduced  herself  into 
Cheyne  Row),  and  Miss  Wilson,  another  accomplished 
friend,  thought  that  Carlyle  should  begin  a  course  of 
lectures  in  London,  and  thereby  raise  a  little  money. 
Carlyle,  it  seems,  gave  '^  grumbling  consent.'  Nothing 
daunted,  the  ladies  found  two  hundred  persons  ready 
each  to  subscribe  a  guinea  to  hear  a  course  of  lectures 
from  him.  The  end  of  it  was  that  he  delivered  six 
discourses  on  German  literature,  which  were  '  excellent 
in  themselves,  and  delivered  with  strange  impressive- 
ness,'  and  ^135  went  into  his  purse. 

In  the  summer  the  French  Revolution  appeared. 
The  sale  at  first  was  slow,  almost  nothing,  for  it  was 
not  '  subscribed  for  '  among  the  booksellers.  Alluding 
to  the  criticisms  which  appeared,  Carlyle  said :  *  Some 
condemn  me,  as  is  very  natural,  for  affectation ;  others 
are  hearty,  even  passionate,  in  their  estimation ;  on  the 
whole,  it  strikes  me  as  not  unlikely  that  the  book  may 
take  some  hold  of  the  English  people,  and  do  them 


74  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

and  itself  a  little  good.'  He  was  right.  Other  his- 
torians have  described  the  Revolution :  Carlyle  repro- 
duces the  Revolution.  He  approaches  history  like  a 
dramatist.  Give  him,  as  in  the  French  Revolution, 
a  weird,  tragic,  awe-inspiring  theme,  and  he  will 
utilise  his  characters,  scenes,  and  circumstances  in 
artistic  subordination  to  the  central  idea.  Carlyle 
might  be  called  a  subjective  dramatist — that  is  to  say, 
his  own  spirit,  thoughts,  and  reflections  get  so  mixed 
up  with  the  history  that  it  is  difficult  to  imagine  the  one 
without  the  other.  Every  now  and  then  the  dramatist 
interrupts  the  tragedy  to  interject  his  own  reflections ; 
in  the  history  the  Carlylean  philosophy  plays  the  part 
of  a  Greek  chorus.  As  an  example  of  Carlyle's  genius 
for  a  dramatic  situation,  take  his  opening  of  the  great 
drama  with  the  death  scene  of  Louis  XV.  Who  does 
not  feel,  in  reading  that  scene,  as  if  the  Furies  were 
not  far  off?  who  does  not  detect  in  the  grotesque 
jostling  of  the  comedy  and  tragedy  of  life  premonitions 
of  the  coming  storm  ? 

*  But  figure  his  thought,  when  Death  is  now  clutch- 
ing at  his  own  heart-strings ;  unlocked  for,  inexorable  ! 
Yes,  poor  Louis,  Death  has  found  thee.  No  palace 
walls  or  lifeguards,  gorgeous  tapestries  or  gilt  buckram 
of  stiffest  ceremonial  could  keep  him  out ;  but  he  is 
here,  here  at  thy  very  life-breath,  and  will  extinguish  it. 
Thou,  whose  whole  existence  hitherto  was  a  chimera  and 
scenic  show,  at  length  becomest  a  reality ;  sumptuous 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  75 

Versailles  bursts  asunder,  like  a  dream,  into  void 
Immensity :  Time  is  done,  and  all  the  scaffolding 
of  Time  falls  wrecked  with  hideous  clangour  round 
thy  soul :  the  pale  Kingdoms  yawn  open ;  there  must 
thou  enter,  naked,  all  unking'd,.  and  await  what  is 
appointed  thee !  .  .  .  .  There  ar&nods  and  sagacious 
glances,  go-betweens,  silk  dowagers  mysteriously  glid- 
ing, with  smiles  for  this  constellation,  sighs  for  that : 
there  is  tremor,  of  hope  or  desperation,  in  several 
hearts.  There  is  the  pale,  grinning  Shadow  of  Death, 
ceremoniously  ushered  along  by  another  grinning 
Shadow,  of  Etiquette ;  at  intervals  the  growl  of  Chapel 
Organs,  like  prayer  by  machinery ;  proclaiming,  as  in 
a  kind  of  horrid  diabolic  horse-laughter,  Vanity  of 
vanities,  all  is  Vanity  I > 

At  every  stage  in  the  narrative,  the  reader  is  im- 
pressed with  the  dramatic  texture  of  Carlyle's  mind. 
No  dramatic  writer  surpasses  him  in  the  art  of  produc- 
ing effects  by  contrasts.  In  the  midst  of  a  vigorous 
description  of  the  storming  of  the  Bastille,  he  rings 
down  the  curtain  for  a  moment  in  order  to  introduce 
the  following  scene  of  idyllic  beauty  :  *  O  evening  sun 
of  July,  how,  at  this  hour,  thy  beams  fall  slant  on 
reapers  amid  peaceful  woody  fields  ;  on  old  women 
spinning  in  cottages ;  on  ships  far  out  in  the  silent 
main ;  on  Balls  at  the  Orangerie  of  Versailles,  where 
high-rouged  Dames  of  the  Palace  are  even  now 
dancing  with  double-jacketed  Hussar  officers; — and 


1 


76  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

also    on    this    roaring    Hell-porch    of    a    Hotel-de- 
Ville ! ' 

Equally  effective  is  Carlyle  in  rendering  vivid  the 
doings  of  the  individual  actors  in  the  drama.  For 
photographic  minuteness  and  startling  realism  what 
can  equal  the  following  : — f  But  see  Camille  Des- 
moulins,  from  the  Cafe*  de  Foy,  rushing  out,  sibylline 
in  face ;  his  hair  streaming,  in  each  hand  a  pistol ! 
He  springs  to  a  table :  the  police  satellites  are  eyeing 
him ;  alive  they  shall  not  take  him,  not  they  alive  him 
alive.  This  time  he  speaks  without  stammering : — 
Friends  !  shall  we  die  like  hunted  hares  ?  Like  sheep 
hounded  into  their  pinfold ;  bleating  for  mercy,  where 
is  no  mercy,  but  only  a  whetted  knife  ?  The  hour  is 
come,  the  supreme  hour  of  Frenchman  and  Man; 
when  Oppressors  are  to  try  conclusions  with  Oppressed ; 
and  the  word  is,  swift  Death,  or  Deliverance  forever. 
Let  such  hour  be  weft-come !  Us,  meseems,  one  cry 
only  befits  :  To  Arms  !  Let  universal  Paris,  universal 
France,  as  with  the  throat  of  the  whirlwind,  sound 
only :  To  arms  ! — "  To  arms  !  "  yell  responsive  the 
innumerable  voices;  like  one  great  voice,  as  of  a 
Demon  yelling  from  the  air:  for  all  faces  wax  fire- 
eyed,  all  hearts  burn  up  into  madness.  In  such,  or 
fitter  words  does  Camille  evoke  the  Elemental  Powers, 
in  this  great  moment — "  Friends,"  continues  Camille, 
"  some  rallying-sign  !  Cockades ;  green  ones — the 
colour  of  Hope ! " — As  with  the  flight  of  locusts, 


THOMAS  CARLYLE 


77 


these  green  tree-leaves ;  green  ribands  from  the  neigh- 
bouring shops :  all  green  things  are  snatched,  and 
made  cockades  of.  Camille  descends  from  his  table ; 
"  stifled  with  embraces,  wetted  with  tears ; "  has  a  bit  of 
green  riband  handed  him ;  sticks  it  in  his  hat.  And 
now  to  Curtius'  Image-shop  there ;  to  the  Boulevards  ; 
to  the  four  winds,  and  rest  not  till  France  be  on  fire ! ' 
As  a  historical  work,  the  French  Revolution  is 
unique.  It  is  precisely  the  kind  of  book  Isaiah 
would  have  written  had  there  been  a  like  Revolution  in 
the  Jewish  kingdom  ;  and  just  as  we  go  to  Isaiah,  not 
for  sociological  guidance,  but  for  ethical  inspiration,  so 
we  turn  to  the  French  Revolution  when  the  mind  and 
heart  are  in  a  state  of  torpor  in  order  to  get  a  series  ot 
shocks  from  the  Carlylean  electric  battery.  From  a 
historian  a  student  expects  light  as  well  as  heat, 
guidance  as  well  as  inspiration.  It  is  not  enough  to 
have  the  great  French  explosion  vividly  photographed 
before  his  eyes;  it  is  equally  necessary  to  know  the 
causes  which  led  to  the  catastrophe.  Here,  as  a 
historian,  Carlyle  is  conspicuously  weak.  His  habit  of 
looking  for  dramatic  situations,  his  passion  for  making 
commonplace  incidents  and  commonplace  men  merely 
the  satellites  of  commanding  personalities,  in  a  word, 
his  theory  that  history  should  deal  with  the  doings 
of  great  men,  prevents  Carlyle  from  dwelling  upon  the 
politico-economic  side  of  national  life.  So  absorbed  is 
he  in  painting  the  Revolution,  that  he  forgets  to  explain 


78  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

|the  Revolution.     We  have  abundance  of  vague  decla- 

/mations  against  shams  in  high  places,  plenty  of  talk 

I  about  God's  judgments,  in  the  style  of  the  Hebrew 

prophets,  but  of  patient  diagnosis,  there  is  none.     As 

Mr  Morley  puts  it  in  his  luminous  essay  on  Carlyle : 

'  To  the  question  whether  mankind  gained  or  lost  by 

the  French  Revolution,  Carlyle  nowhere  gives  a  clear 

answer ;  indeed,  on  this  subject  more  than  any  other, 

he  clings  closely  to  his  favourite  method  of  simple 

presentation,  streaked  with  dramatic  irony He 

draws  its  general  moral  lesson  from  the  Revolution, 
and  with  clangorous  note  warns  all  whom  it  concerns 
from  King  to  Church  that  imposture  must  come  to  an 
end.  But  for  the  precise  amount  and  kind  of  dissolu- 
tion which  the  West  owes  to  it,  for  the  political  mean- 
ing of  it,  as  distinguished  from  its  moral  or  its  dramatic 
significance,  we  seek  in  vain,  finding  no  word  on  the 
subject,  nor  even  evidence  of  consciousness  that  such 
word  is  needed.'  Had  Carlyle,  in  addition  to  his 
genius  as  a  historical  dramatist,  possessed  the  patient 
diagnosing  power  of  the  writers  and  thinkers  whom  he 
derided,  his  French  Revolution  would  have  taken  its 
place  in  historical  literature  as  an  epoch-making  book. 
As  it  stands,  the  reader  who  desires  to  have  an  intelli- 
gible knowledge  of  the  subject,  is  compelled  to  shake 
himself  free  of  the  Carlylean  mesmerism,  and  have 
recourse  to  those  writers  whom  Carlyle,  under  the 
opprobious  names  of  'logic-choppers'  and  'dry-as- 
dusts,'  held  up  to  public  ridicule. 


CHAPTER   V 

HOLIDAY    JOURNEYINGS LITERARY    WORK 

CARLYLE  was  so  broken  down  with  his  efforts  upon  the 
French  Revolution  that  a  trip  to  Annandale  became 
necessary.  He  stayed  at  Scotsbrig  two  months, 
'  wholly  idle,  reading  novels,  smoking  pipes  in  the 
garden  with  his  mother,  hearing  notices  of  his  book 
from  a  distance,  but  not  looking  for  them  or  caring 
about  them.'  Autumn  brought  Carlyle  back  to  Cheyne 
Row,  when  he  found  his  wife  in  better  health,  de- 
lighted to  have  him  again  at  her  side.  She  knew,  as 
Froude  points  out,  though  Carlyle,  so  little  vain  was 
he,  had  failed  as  yet  to  understand  it,  that  he  had 
returned  to  a  changed  position,  that  he  was  no  longer 
lonely  and  neglected,  but  had  taken  his  natural  place 
among  the  great  writers  of  his  day.  He  sent  bright 
accounts  of  himself  to  Scotsbrig.  '  I  find  John  Ster- 
ling here,  and  many  friends,  all  kinder  each  than  the 
other  to  me.  With  talk  and  locomotion  the  days  pass 
cheerfully  till  I  rest  and  gird  myself  together  again. 
They  make  a  great  talk  about  the  book,  which  seems 
to  have  succeeded  in  a  far  higher  degree  than  I  looked 

79 


8o  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

for.  Everybody  is  astonished  at  every  other  body's 
being  pleased  with  this  wonderful  performance.'  * 

Carlyle  did  nothing  all  the  winter  except  to  write 
his  essay  on  Sir  Walter  Scott.  His  next  task  was  to 
prepare  for  a  second  course  of  lectures  in  the  spring 
on  '  Heroes.'  The  course  ended  with  '  a  blaze  of  fire- 
works— people  weeping  at  the  passionately  earnest  tone 
in  which  for  once  they  heard  themselves  addressed.' 
The  effort  brought  Carlyle  ^300  after  all  expenses 
had  been  paid.  *  A  great  blessing,'  he  remarked,  '  to 
a  man  that  had  been  haunted  by  the  squalid  spectre 
of  beggary/ 

Carlyle  had  no  intention  of  visiting  Scotland  that 
autumn,  but  having  received  a  pressing  invitation  from 
old  friends  at  Kirkcaldy,  he  took  steamer  to  Leith  in 
August.  While  at  Kirkcaldy  he  crossed  to  Edinburgh 
and  called  on  Jeffrey.  '  He  sat,'  says  Carlyle,  '  waiting 
for  me  at  Moray  Place.  We  talked  long  in  the  style 
of  literary  and  philosophic  clitter-clatter.  Finally  it 
was  settled  that  I  should  go  out  to  dinner  with  him 
at  Craigcrook,  and  not  return  to  Fife  till  the  morrow.' 
They  dined  and  abstained  from  contradicting  each 
other,  Carlyle  admitting  that  Jeffrey  was  becoming  an 
amiable  old  fribble,  '  very  cheerful,  very  heartless,  very 
forgettable  and  tolerable.' 

On  his  return  to  London,  equal  to  work  again, 
Carlyle  found  all  well.  He  was  gratified  to  hear  that 
*  Froude's  '  Life  in  London,'  vol.  i.  p.  115. 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  81 

the  eighth  edition  of  the  French  Revolution  was  almost 
sold,  and  that  another  would  be  called  for,  while  there 
were  numerous  applications  from  review  editors  for 
articles  if  he  would  please  to  supply  them.  Mill  about 
this  time  asked  him  to  contribute  a  paper  on  Cromwell 
to  the  London  and  Westminster  Review.  Carlyle  agreed, 
and  was  preparing  to  begin  when  the  negotiations  were 
broken  off.  Mill  had  gone  abroad,  leaving  a  Mr 
Robertson  to  manage  the  Review.  Robertson  coolly 
wrote  to  say  that  he  need  not  go  on  with  the  article, 
'  for  he  meant  to  do  Cromwell  himself/  Carlyle  was 
wroth,  and  that  incident  determined  him  to  'throw 
himself  seriously  into  the  history  of  the  Commonwealth, 
and  to  expose  himself  no  more  to  cavalier  treatment  from 
"  able  editors." '  But  for  that  task  he  required  books. 
Then  it  was  that  the  idea  of  founding  a  London  library 
occurred  to  him.  Men  of  position  took  up  the  matter 
warmly,  and  Carlyle's  object  was  accomplished.  '  Let 
the  tens  of  thousands/  says  Mr  Froude,  '  who,  it  is  to 
be  hoped,  "  are  made  better  and  wiser "  by  the  books 
collected  there,  remember  that  they  owe  the  privilege 
entirely  to  Carlyle.' 

One  of  Carlyle's  new  acquaintances  was  Monckton 
Milnes,  who  asked  him  to  breakfast.  Carlyle  used  to 
say  that  if  Christ  were  again  on  earth  Milnes  would 
ask  Him  to  breakfast,  and  the  clubs  would  all  be  talk- 
ing of  the  '  good  things '  that  Christ  had  said.  He  also 
became  familiar  with  Mr  Baring,  afterwards  Lord  Ash- 

X  F 


82  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

burton,  and  his  accomplished  wife,  who  in  course  of 
time  exercised  a  disturbing  influence  over  the  Carlyle 
household.  It  would  not  tend  to  edification  to  dwell 
upon  the  domestic  misunderstandings  at  Cheyne  Row ; 
besides,  are  not  they  to  be  found  detailed  at  great 
length  in  Froude's  Life,  the  Reminiscences,  and  Letters 
and  Memorials  ?  Although  Carlyle  was  taking  life 
somewhat  easy,  he  was  making  preparations  for  his  third 
course  of  lectures,  his  subject  being  the  'Revolutions 
of  Modern  Europe.'  They  did  not  please  the  lecturer, 
but  the  audiences  were  as  enthusiastic  as  ever,  and  he 
made  a  clear  gain  of  ^200. 

About  this  time  Emerson  was  pressing  him  to  go 
to  Boston  on  a  lecturing  tour.  But  Carlyle  thought 
better  of  it.  More  important  work  awaited  him  in 
London.  'All  his  life,'  says  Froude,  'he  had  been 
meditating  on  the  problem  of  the  working-man's  exist- 
ence in  this  country  at  the  present  epoch 

He  had  seen  the  Glasgow  riots  in  1819.  He  had 
heard  his  father  talk  of  the  poor  masons,  dining  silently 
upon  water  and  water-cresses.  His  letters  are  full  of 
reflections  on  such  things,  sad  or  indignant,  as  the 
humour  might  be.  He  was  himself  a  working-man's 
son.  He  had  been  bred  in  a  peasant  home,  and  all 
his  sympathies  were  with  his  own  class.  He  was  not 
a  revolutionist ;  he  knew  well  that  violence  would  be 
no  remedy;  that  there  lay  only  madness  and  deeper 
misery.  But  the  fact  remained,  portending  frightful 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  83 

issues.  The  Reform  Bill  was  to  have  mended  matters 
but  the  Reform  Bill  had  gone  by  and  the  poor  were 
none  the  happier.  The  power  of  the  State  had  been 
shifted  from  the  aristocracy  to  the  mill-owners,  and 
merchants,  and  shopkeepers.  That  was  all.  The 
handicraftsman  remained  where  he  was,  or  was  sink- 
ing, rather,  into  an  unowned  Arab,  to  whom  "  freedom  " 
meant  freedom  to  work  if  the  employer  had  work  to 
offer  him  conveniently  to  himself,  or  else  freedom  to 
starve.  The  fruit  of  such  a  state  of  society  as  this  was 
the  Sansculottism  on  which  he  had  been  lecturing,  and 
he  felt  that  he  must  put  his  thoughts  upon  it  in  a  per- 
manent form.  He  had  no  faith  in  political  remedies, 
in  extended  suffrages,  recognition  of  "the  rights  of 
man,"  etc. — absolutely  none.  That  was  the  road  on 
which  the  French  had  gone ;  and,  if  tried  in  England, 
it  would  end  as  it  ended  with  them — in  anarchy,  and 
hunger,  and  fury.  The  root  of  the  mischief  was  the 
forgetfulness  on  the  part  of  the  upper  classes,  increas- 
ing now  to  flat  denial,  that  they  owed  any  duty  to 
those  under  them  beyond  the  payment  of  contract 
wages  at  the  market  price.  The  Liberal  theory,  as 
formulated  in  Political  Economy,  was  that  every  one 
should  attend  exclusively  to  his  own  interests,  and  that 
the  best  of  all  possible  worlds  would  be  the  certain 
result.  His  own  conviction  was  that  the  result  would 
be  the  worst  of  all  possible  worlds,  a  world  in  which 


84  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

human  life,  such  a  life  as  human  beings  ought  to  live, 
would  become  impossible.'  * 

He  wrote  to  his  brother  when  his  lectures  were  over: 
'Guess  what  immediate  project  I  am  on;  that  of 
writing  an  article  on  the  working-classes  for  the 
"Quarterly."  It  is  verily  so.  I  offered  to  do  the 
thing  for  Mill  about  a  year  ago.  He  durst  not.  I  felt 
a  kind  of  call  and  monition  of  duty  to  do  it,  wrote 
to  Lockhart  accordingly,  was  altogether  invitingly 
answered,  had  a  long  interview  with  the  man  yesterday, 
found  him  a  person  of  sense,  good-breeding,  even  kind- 
ness, and  great  consentaneity  of  opinion  with  myself  on 
the  matter.  Am  to  get  books  from  him  to-morrow, 
and  so  shall  forthwith  set  about  telling  the  Conserva- 
tives a  thing  or  two  about  the  claims,  condition,  rights, 
and  mights  of  the  working  order  of  men.' 

When  the  annual  exodus  from  London  came,  the 
Carlyles  went  north  for  a  holiday.  They  returned 
much  refreshed  at  the  end  of  two  months.  His  pre- 
sence, moreover,  was  required  in  London,  as  Wilhelm 
Meister  was  now  to  be  republished.  He  set  about 
finishing  his  article  for  the  "  Quarterly,"  but  as  he  pro- 
gressed he  felt  some  misgiving  as  to  its  ever  appearing 
in  that  magazine.  'I  have  finished/  he  wrote  on 
November  8,  1839,  'a  long  review  article,  thick 
pamphlet,  or  little  volume,  entitled  "  Chartism."  Lock- 
hart  has  it,  for  it  was  partly  promised  to  him  ;  at  least 
*  Froude's  '  Life  in  London,'  vol.  i.  pp.  161-62. 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  85 

the  refusal  of  it  was,  and  that,  I  conjecture,  will  be  all 
he  will  enjoy  of  it.'  Lockhart  sent  it  back,  '  seemingly 
not  without  reluctance,'  saying  he  dared  not.  Mill  was 
shown  the  pamphlet  and  was  '  unexpectedly  delighted 
with  it.'  He  was  willing  to  publish  it,  but  Carlyle's 
wife  and  brother  insisted  that  the  thing  was  too  good 
for  a  magazine  article.  Eraser  undertook  to  print  it, 
and  before  the  close  of  the  year  Chartism  was  in  the 
hands  of  the  public. 

The  sale  was  rapid,  an  edition  of  a  thousand  copies 
being  sold  immediately.  ' Chartism,'  Froude  narrates, 
was  loudly  noticed:  "considerable  reviewing,  but 
very  daft  reviewing."  Men  wondered;  how  could 
they  choose  but  wonder,  when  a  writer  of  evident 
power  stripped  bare  the  social  disease,  told  them  that 
their  remedies  were  quack  remedies,  and  their  progress 
was  progress  to  dissolution?  The  Liberal  journals, 
finding  their  "  formulas  "  disbelieved  in,  clamoured  that 
Carlyle  was  unorthodox;  no  Radical,  but  a  wolf  in 
sheep's  clothing.  Yet  what  he  said  was  true,  and 
could  not  be  denied  to  be  true.  "They  approve 
generally,"  he  said,  "  but  regret  very  much  that  I  am  a 
Tory.  Stranger  Tory,  in  my  opinion,  has  not  been 
fallen  in  with  in  these  later  generations."  Again  a  few 
weeks  later  (February  1 1) :  "  The  people  are  beginning 
to  discover  that  I  am  not  a  Tory.  Ah,  no !  but  one 
of  the  deepest,  though  perhaps  the  quietest,  of  all  the 
Radicals  now  extant  in  the  world — a  thing  productive 


86  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

of  small  comfort  to  several  persons.     They  have  said, 
and  they  will  say,  and  let  them  say." 

His  final  course  of  lectures  now  confronted  him, 
and  these  he  entitled  Heroes  and  Hero  Worship.  He 
tells  his  mother  (May  26,  1840) :  'The  lecturing  busi- 
ness went  off  with  sufficient  eclat.  The  course  was 
generally  judged,  and  I  rather  join  therein  myself,  to 
be  the  bad  best  I  have  yet  given.  On  the  last  day — 
Friday  last — I  went  to  speak  of  Cromwell  with  a  head 
full  of 'air ;  you  know  that  wretched  physical  feeling;  I 
had  been  concerned  with  drugs,  had  awakened  at  five, 
etc.  It  is  absolute  martyrdom.  My  tongue  would 
hardly  wag  at  all  when  I  got  done.  Yet  the  good 
people  sate  breathless,  or  broke  out  into  all  kinds  of 
testimonies  of  goodwill.  ...  In  a  word,  we  got  right 
handsomely  through.'  That  was  Carlyle's  last  appear- 
ance as  a  public  lecturer.  He  was  now  the  observed 
of  all  observers  in  London  society ;  but  he  was  weary 
of  lionising  and  junketings.  'What,' he  notes  in  his 
journal  on  June  15,  1840,  'are  lords  coming  to  call  on 
one  and  fill  one's  head  with  whims  ?  They  ask  you  to 
go  among  champagne,  bright  glitter,  semi-poisonous 
excitements  which  you  do  not  like  even  for  the  moment, 
and  you  are  sick  for  a  week  after.  As  old  Tom  White 
said  of  whisky,  "  Keep  it — Deevil  a  ever  I'se  better 
than  when  there's  no  a  drop  on't  i'  my  weam."  So  say 
I  of  dinner  popularity,  lords  and  lionism — Keep  it ; 
give  it  to  those  that  like  it.' 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  87 

Carlyle  was  much  refreshed  at  this  period  by  visits 
from  Tennyson.  Here  is  what  he  says  of  the  poet : 
'  A  fine,  large-featured,  dim-eyed,  bronze-coloured, 
shaggy-headed  man  is  Alfred ;  dusty,  smoky,  free  and 
easy,  who  swims  outwardly  and  inwardly  with  great 
composure  in  an  inarticulate  element  of  tranquil  chaos 
and  tobacco  smoke.  Great  now  and  then  when  he  does 
emerge — a  most  restful,  brotherly,  solid-hearted  man." 

In  a  note  to  his  brother  John  on  September  n, 
1840,  he  says:  *I  have  again  some  notions  towards 
writing  a  book — let  us  see  what  comes  of  that.  It  is 
the  one  use  of  living,  for  me.  Enough  to-day.'  The 
book  he  had  in  view  was  Cromwell.  Journalising  on 
the  day  after  Christmas  he  laments — '  Oliver  Cromwell 
will  not  prosper  with  me  at  all.  I  began  reading  about 
that  subject  some  four  months  ago.  I  learn  almost 
nothing  by  reading,  yet  cannot  as  yet  heartily  begin  to 
write.  Nothing  on  paper  yet.  I  know  not  where  to 
begin.' 

At  the  end  of  the  year  Mrs  Carlyle  wrote  :  '  Carlyle 
is  reading  voraciously,  preparatory  to  writing  a  new 
book.  For  the  rest,  he  growls  away  much  in  the  old 
style.  But  one  gets  to  feel  a  certain  indifference  to  his 
growling;  if  one  did  not,  it  would  be  the  worse  for 
one.'  A  month  or  two  later,  Carlyle  writes  :  '  Think 
not  hardly  of  me,  dear  Jeannie.  In  the  mutual  misery 
we  often  are  in,  we  do  not  know  how  dear  we  are  to 
one  another.  By  the  help  of  Heaven,  I  shall  get  a  little 


&8  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

better,  and  somewhat  of  it  shall  abate.  Last  night,  at 
dinner,  Richard  Milnes  made  them  all  laugh  with  a 
saying  of  yours.  "  When  the  wife  has  influenza,  it  is  a 
slight  cold — when  the  man  has  it,  it  is,  &c.,  &c."'  Writing 
to  Sterling  he  exclaims,  *  I  shall  verily  fly  to  Craigen- 
puttock  again  before  long.  Yet  I  know  what  solitude 
is,  and  imprisonment  among  black  cattle  and  peat 
bogs.  The  truth  is,  we  are  never  right  as  we  are. 
"  Oh,  the  devil  burn  it " !  said  the  Irish  drummer 
flogging  his  countryman ;  "  there's  no  pleasing  of  you, 
strike  where  one  will." ' 

Milnes  prevailed  on  Carlyle,  instead  of  flying  to  the 
bleak  expanse  of  Craigenputtock,  to  accompany  him  to 
his  father's  house  at  Fryston,  in  Yorkshire,  whence 
he  sent  a  series  of  affectionate  and  graphic  letters  to 
Mrs  Carlyle.  Being  so  far  north,  he  took  a  run  to 
Dumfriesshire  to  see  his  mother,  who  had  been  slightly 
ailing.  He  was  back  in  London,  however,  in  May, 
but  not  improved  in  mind  or  body.  It  was  a  hot 
summer,  and  the  Carlyles  went  to  Scotsbrig,  and  took 
a  cottage  at  Newby,  close  to  Annan.  By  the  end  of 
September,  Carlyle  was  back  in  Cheyne  Row.  His 
latest  hero  still  troubled  him.  '  Ought  I,'  he  asks,  '  to 
write  now  of  Oliver  Cromwell  ?  .  .  .  I  cannot  yet  see 
clearly.' 

Carlyle  at  one  time  had  a  hankering  after  a  Scottish 
professorship,  but  the  '  door  had  been  shut  in  his  face,' 
sometimes  contemptuously.  He  was  now  famous,  and 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  89 

the  young  Edinburgh  students,  having  looked  into  his 
lectures  on  Heroes,  began  to  think  that,  whatever 
might  be  the  opinions  of  the  authorities  and  patrons, 
they  for  their  part  must  consider  lectures  such  as  these 
a  good  exchange  for  what  was  provided  for  them.  A 
*  History  Chair '  was  about  to  be  established.  A  party 
of  them,  represented  by  a  Mr  Dunipace,  presented  a 
requisition  to  the  Faculty  of  Advocates  to  appoint 
Carlyle.  When  asked  his  consent  to  be  nominated, 
Carlyle  replied  :  *  Accept  my  kind  thanks,  you  and  all 
your  associates,  for  your  zeal  to  serve  me.  .  .  .  Ten 
years  ago  such  an  invitation  might  perhaps  have  been 
decisive  of  much  for  me,  but  it  is  too  late  now ;  too 
late  for  many  reasons,  which  I  need  not  trouble  you 
with  at  present.' 

A  very  severe  blow  now  fell  upon  Mrs  Carlyle,  who 
received  news  from  Templand  that  her  mother  had 
been  struck  by  apoplexy,  and  was  dangerously  ill. 
Although  unfit  for  travelling,  she  caught  the  first  train 
from  Euston  Square  to  Liverpool,  but  at  her  uncle's 
house  there  she  learnt  that  all  was  over.  Mrs  Carlyle 
lay  ill  in  Liverpool,  unable  to  stir.  After  a  while  she 
was  able  to  go  back  to  London,  where  Carlyle  joined 
her  in  the  month  of  May.  It  was  on  his  return  journey 
that  he  paid  a  visit  to  Dr  Arnold  at  Rugby,  when  he 
had  an  opportunity,  under  his  host's  genial  guidance, 
to  explore  the  field  of  Naseby. 

His  sad  occupations  in  Scotland,  and  the  sad  thoughts 


90  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

they  suggested,  made  Carlyle  disinclined  for  society. 
He  had  a  room  arranged  for  him  at  the  top  of  his 
house,  and  there  he  sate  and  smoked,  and  read  books 
on  Cromwell,  '  the  sight  of  Naseby  having  brought  the 
subject  back  out  of  "  the  abysses." '  Meanwhile  he 
had  a  pleasant  trip  to  Ostend  with  Mr  Stephen  Spring 
Rice,  Commissioner  of  Customs,  of  which  he  wrote 
vivid  descriptions. 

On  October  25,  1842,  Carlyle  wrote  in  his  journal: 
*  For  many  months  there  has  been  no  writing  here. 
Alas  !  what  was  there  to  write  ?  About  myself,  nothing ; 
or  less,  if  that  was  possible.  I  have  not  got  one  word 
to  stand  upon  paper  in  regard  to  Oliver.  The  begin- 
nings of  work  are  even  more  formidable  than  the 
executing  of  it.'  But  another  subject  was  to  engross 
his  attention  for  a  little  while.  The  distress  of  the 
poor  became  intense;  less  in  London,  however,  than 
in  other  large  towns.  '  I  declare,'  he  wrote  to  his  mother 
early  in  January  1843,  CI  declare  I  begin  to  feel  as  if 
I  should  not  hold  my  peace  any  longer,  as  if  I  should 
perhaps  open  my  mouth  in  a  way  that  some  of  them 
are  not  expecting — we  shall  see  if  this  book  were 
done.'  On  the  2oth  he  wrote :  '  I  hope  it  will  be 
a  rather  useful  kind  of  book.'  He  could  not  go  on 
with  Cromwell  till  he  had  unburdened  his  soul.  '  The 
look  of  the  world,'  he  said,  '  is  really  quite  oppressive 
to  me.  Eleven  thousand  souls  in  Paisley  alone  living 
on  threehalfpence  a  day,  and  the  governors  of  the  land 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  91 

all  busy  shooting  partridges  and  passing  corn-laws  the 
while !  It  is  a  thing  no  man  with  a  speaking  tongue 
in  his  head  is  entitled  to  be  silent  about/  The  out- 
come of  all  his  soul-burnings  and  cogitations  was  Past 
and  Present,  which  appeared  at  the  beginning  of  April. 
The  reviewers  set  to  work,  *  wondering,  admiring, 
blaming,  chiefly  the  last.' 

Carlyle  then  undertook  several  journeys,  chiefly  in 
order  to  visit  Cromwellian  battlefields,  the  sight  of  which 
made  the  Oliver  enterprise  no  longer  impossible.  He 
found  a  renovated  house  on  his  return,  and  Mrs  Carlyle 
writing  on  November  28th,  describes  him  as  c  over  head 
and  ears  in  Cromwell,'  and  '  lost  to  humanity  for  the 
time  being.'  Six  months  later,  he  makes  this  admission 
in  his  journal — '  My  progress  in  "  Cromwell "  is  fright- 
ful. I  am  no  day  absolutely  idle,  but  the  confusions 
that  lie  in  my  way  require  far  more  fire  of  energy  than 
I  can  muster  on  most  days,  and  I  sit  not  so  much  work- 
ing as  painfully  looking  on  work.'  Four  months  later, 
when  Cromwell  was  progressing  slowly,  Carlyle  suffered 
a  severe  personal  loss  by  the  death  of  John  Sterling. 
'  Sterling,'  says  Froude,  '  had  been  his  spiritual  pupil, 
his  first,  and  also  his  noblest  and  best.  Consumption 
had  set  its  fatal  mark  upon  him.'  Carlyle  drowned 
his  sorrow  in  hard  work,  and  in  July  1845  tne  end  of 
Cromwell  was  coming  definitely  in  sight.  In  his  journal 
under  date  August  26th,  is  to  be  found  this  entry :  'I 
have  this  moment  ended  Oliver ;  hang  it !  He  is  ended, 


92  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

thrums  and  all.  I  have  nothing  more  to  write  on  the 
subject,  only  mountains  of  wreck  to  burn.  Not  (any 
more)  up  to  the  chin  in  paper  clippings  and  chaotic 
litter,  hatefuller  to  me  than  most.  I  am  to  have  a  swept 
floor  now  again.'  And  thus  the  herculean  labours  of 
five  years  were  ended.  His  desire  was  to  be  in  Scot- 
land, and  he  made  his  way  northwards  by  the  usual 
sea  route  to  Annan  and  Scotsbrig.  He  did  not  remain 
long  away,  and  upon  his  return  Cromwell  was  just 
issuing  from  the  press.  It  was  received  with  great 
favour,  the  sale  was  rapid,  and  additional  materials 
came  from  unexpected  quarters.  In  February  1846  a 
new  edition  was  needed  in  order  to  insert  fresh  letters 
of  Oliver  according  to  date;  a  process,  Carlyle  said 
'requiring  one's  most  excellent  talent,  as  of  shoe- 
cobbling,  really  that  kind  of  talent  carried  to  a  high 
pitch.'  When  completed,  Carlyle  presented  a  copy  of 
it  to  the  Prime  Minister,  Sir  Robert  Peel,  a  step  he 
never  took  before  or  after  with  any  of  his  writings, — a 
compliment  which  Peel  gracefully  acknowledged. 

Carlyle's  plans  for  the  summer  of  1846  were,  a  visit 
to  his  mother  and  a  run  across  to  Ireland.  Charles 
Gavan  Duffy  of  the  Nation  newspaper  saw  him  in 
London  in  consequence  of  what  he  had  written  in 
Chartism  about  misgovernment  in  Ireland.  He  had 
promised  to  go  over  and  see  what  the  '  Young  Ireland ' 
movement  was  doing.  On  the  3ist  of  August  he  left 
Scotsbrig,  and  landed  in  due  course  at  Belfast,  where 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  93 

he  was  to  have  been  met  by  John  Mitchel  and  Gavan 
Duffy  and  driven  to  Drogheda.  He  missed  his  two 
friends  through  a  mistake  at  the  post-office,  and  hurried 
on  by  railway  to  Dublin.  He  met  them  at  Dundrum, 
and  was  there  entertained  at  a  large  dinner-party. 
Next  day  he  dined  at  Mitchel's.  His  stay  was  remark- 
ably short.  He  took  steamer  at  Kingstown,  and  in  the 
early  morning  of  September  i  oth  *  he  was  sitting  smok- 
ing a  cigar  before  the  door  of  his  wife's  uncle's  house 
in  Liverpool  till  the  household  should  awake  and  let 
him  in.' 

In  June  1847  Carlyle  relates  that  they  had  a  flying 
visit  from  Jeffrey.  'A  much  more  interesting  visitor 
than  Jeffrey  was  old  Dr  Chalmers,  who  came  down  to 
us  also  last  week,  whom  I  had  not  seen  before  for,  I 
think,  five-and-twenty  years.  It  was  a  pathetic  meet- 
ing. The  good  old  man  is  grown  white-headed,  but  is 
otherwise  wonderfully  little  altered — grave,  deliberate, 
very  gentle  in  his  deportment,  but  with  plenty  too  of 
soft  energy ;  full  of  interest  still  for  all  serious  things, 
full  of  real  kindliness,  and  sensible  even  to  honest  mirth 
in  a  fair  measure.  He  sate  with  us  an  hour  and  a 
half,  went  away  with  our  blessings  and  affections.  It  is 
long  since  I  have  spoken  to  so  good  and  really  pious- 
hearted  and  beautiful  old  man.'  In  a  week  or  two 
Chalmers  was  suddenly  called  away.  '  I  believe,'  wrote 
Carlyle  to  his  mother,  '  there  is  not  in  all  Scotland,  or 
all  Europe,  any  such  Christian  priest  left.  It  will  long 
be  memorable  to  us,  the  little  visit  we  had  from  him. 


94  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

Early  in  1848,  the  Jew  Bill  was  before  Parliament, 
and  the  fate  of  it  doubtful,  narrates  Mr  Froude.  Baron 
Rothschild  wrote  to  ask  Carlyle  to  write  a  pamphlet  in 
its  favour,  and  intimated  that  he  might  name  any  sum 
which  he  liked  to  ask  as  payment.  Froude  enquired 
how  he  answered.  '  Well,'  he  said,  '  I  had  to  tell  him 
it  couldn't  be ;  but  I  observed,  too,  that  I  could  not 
conceive  why  he  and  his  friends,  who  were  supposed 
to  be  looking  out  for  the  coming  of  Shiloh,  should  be 
seeking  seats  in  a  Gentile  legislature.'  Froude  asked 
what  the  Baron  said  to  that.  *  Why,'  said  Carlyle,  '  he 
seemed  to  think  the  coming  of  Shiloh  was  a  dubious 
business,  and  that  meanwhile,  etc.,  etc.* 

On  February  9,  1848,  Carlyle  wrote  in  his  journal: 
*  Chapman's  money  [Chapman  &  Hall  were  his  pub- 
lishers] all  paid,  lodged  now  in  the  Dumfries  Bank. 
New  edition  of  "Sartor"  to  be  wanted  soon.  My  poor 
books  of  late  have  yielded  me  a  certain  fluctuating 
annual  income ;  at  all  events,  I  am  quite  at  my  ease 
as  to  money,  and  that  on  such  low  terms.  I  often 
wonder  at  the  luxurious  ways  of  the  age.  Some 
^1500,  I  think,  is  what  has  accumulated  in  the  bank. 
Of  fixed  income  (from  Craigenputtock)  ^150  a  year. 
Perhaps  as  much  from  my  books  may  lie  fixed  amid 
the  huge  fluctuation  (last  year,  for  instance,  it  was 
;£8oo :  the  year  before,  ;£ioo;  the  year  before  that, 
about  ^700;  this  year,  again,  it  is  like  to  be  ^100; 
the  next  perhaps  nothing — very  fluctuating  indeed) — 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  95 

some  £z°°  in  all,  and  that  amply  suffices  me.  For 
my  wife  is  the  best  of  housewives ;  noble,  too,  in  refer- 
ence to  the  property,  which  is  hers,  which  she  has  never 
once  in  the  most  distant  way  seemed  to  know  to  be 
hers.  Be  this  noted  and  remembered ;  my  thrifty  little 
lady — every  inch  a  lady — ah  me  !  In  short,  I  auth- 
entically feel  indifferent  to  money ;  would  not  go  this 
way  or  that  to  gain  more  money.'  * 

The  Revolution  of  February  24th  at  Paris  surprised 
Carlyle  less  than  most  of  his  contemporaries,  as  it  con- 
firmed what  he  had  been  saying  for  years.  He  did 
not  believe,  we  are  told,  in  immediate  convulsion  in 
England ;  but  he  did  believe  that,  unless  England  took 
warning  and  mended  her  ways,  her  turn  would  come. 
The  excitement  in  London  was  intense,  and  leading 
men  expressed  themselves  freely,  but  Carlyle's  general 
thoughts  were  uttered  in  a  lengthy  letter  to  Thomas 
Erskine  of  Linlathen,  for  whom  he  entertained  a  warm 
regard.  On  March  14  he  met  Macaulay  at  Lord 
Mahon's  at  breakfast ;  '  Niagara  of  eloquent  common- 
place talk/  he  says,  'from  Macaulay.  "Very  good- 
natured  man";  man  cased  in  official  mail  of  proof; 
stood  my  impatient  fire-explosions  with  much  patience, 
merely  hissing  a  little  steam  up,  and  continued  his 
Niagara — supply  and  demand ;  power  ruinous  to  power- 
ful himself;  /^possibility  of  Government  doing  more 
than  keep  the  peace ;  suicidal  distraction  of  new  French 
*  Froude's  '  Life  iu  London,'  vol.  i.  p.  420. 


96  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

Republic,  etc.  Essentially  irremediable,  commonplace 
nature  of  the  man ;  all  that  was  in  him  now  gone  to 
the  tongue ;  a  squat,  thickset,  low-browed,  short,  grizzled 
little  man  of  fifty.' 

One  of  the  few  men  Carlyle  was  anxious  to  see 
was  Sir  Robert  Peel.  He  was  introduced  by  the 
Barings  at  a  dinner  at  Bath  House.  Carlyle  sat  next 
to  Peel,  whom  he  describes  as  '  a  finely-made  man  of 
strong,  not  heavy,  rather  of  elegant,  stature;  stands 
straight,  head  slightly  thrown  back,  and  eyelids  mod- 
estly drooping ;  every  way  mild  and  gentle,  yet  with 
less  of  that  fixed  smile  than  the  portraits  give  him. 
He  is  towards  sixty,  and,  though  not  broken  at  all, 
carries,  especially  in  his  complexion,  when  you  are 
near  him,  marks  of  that  age;  clear,  strong  blue  eyes 
which  kindle  on  occasion,  voice  extremely  good,  low- 
toned,  something  of  cooing  in  it,  rustic,  affectionate, 
honest,  mildly  persuasive.  Spoke  about  French  Re- 
volutions new  and  old ;  well  read  in  all  that ;  had  seen 
General  Dumouriez;  reserved  seemingly  by  nature, 
obtrudes  nothing  of  diplomatic  reserve.  On  the  con- 
trary, a  vein  of  mild  fun  in  him,  real  sensibility  to  the 

ludicrous,  which  feature  I  liked  best  of  all I 

consider  him  by  far  our  first  public  man — which,  in- 
deed, is  saying  little — and  hope  that  England  in  these 
frightful  times  may  still  get  some  good  of  him.  N.B. — 
This  night  with  Peel  was  the  night  in  which  Berlin  city 
executed  its  last  terrible  battle,  (i9th  of  March  to 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  97 

Sunday  morning  the  2oth,  five  o'clock.)  While  we  sate 
there  the  streets  of  Berlin  city  were  all  blazing  with  grape- 
shot  and  the  war  of  enraged  men.  What  is  to  become 
of  all  that  ?  I  have  a  book  to  write  about  it.  Alas  ! " 
We  hear  of  a  great  Chartist  petition  to  be  presented 
by  200,000  men.  People  here  keep  up  their  foolish 
levity  in  speaking  of  these  things;  but  considerate 
persons  find  them  to  be  very  grave;  and  indeed  all, 
even  the  laughers,  are  in  considerable  secret  alarm.'  * 

At  such  a  time  Carlyle  knew  that  he,  the  author  of 
Chartism,  ought  to  say  something.  Foolish  people, 
too,  came  pressing  for  his  opinions.  Not  seeing  his 
way  to  a  book  upon  '  Democracy,'  he  wrote  a  good 
many  newspaper  articles,  chiefly  in  the  Examiner  and 
the  Spectator,  to  deliver  his  soul.  Even  Fonblanque 
and  Rintoul  (the  editors),  remarks  Froude,  friendly 
though  they  were  to  him,  could  not  allow  him  his  full 
swing.  '  There  is  no  established  journal,'  complained 
Carlyle,  '  that  can  stand  my  articles,  no  single  one  they 
would  not  blow  the  bottom  out  of.7 

On  July  1 2  occurs  this  entry  in  his  journal :  '  Chart- 
ist concern,  and  Irish  Repeal  concern,  and  French 
Republic  concern  have  all  gone  a  bad  way  since  the 
March  entry — April  20  (immortal  day  already  dead), 
day  of  Chartist  monster  petition ;  200,000  special 
constables  swore  themselves  in,  etc.,  and  Chartism 
came  to  nothing.  Riots  since,  but  the  leaders  all 

*  Froude's  '  Life  in  London,'  vol.  i.  pp.  433-4. 
I  G 


98  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

lodged  in  gaol,  tried,  imprisoned  for  two  years,  etc., 
and  so  ends  Chartism  for  the  present.  Irish  Mitchel, 
poor  fellow !  is  now  in  Bermuda  as  a  felon ;  letter  from 
him,  letter  to  him,  letter  to  and  from  Lord  Clarendon 
— was  really  sorry  for  poor  Mitchel.  But  what  help  ? 
French  Republic  cannonaded  by  General  Cavaignac ;  a 
sad  outlook  there.'  * 

Carlyle's  Cromwell  had  created  a  set  of  enthusiastic 
admirers  who  were  bent  on  having  a  statue  of  the 
great  Protector  set  up.  Carlyle  was  asked  to  give  his 
sanction  to  the  proposal.  Writing  to  his  mother,  he 
said:  'The  people  having  subscribed  ,£25,000  for  a 
memorial  to  an  ugly  bullock  of  a  Hudson,  who  did  not 
even  pretend  to  have  any  merit  except  that  of  being 
suddenly  rich,  and  who  is  now  discovered  to  be  little 
other  than  at  heart  a  horse-coper  and  dishonest  fellow, 
I  think  they  ought  to  leave  Cromwell  alone  of  their 
memorials,  and  try  to  honour  him  in  some  more  profit- 
able way — by  learning  to  be  honest  men  like  him,  for 
example.  But  we  shall  see  what  comes  of  all  this 
Cromwell  work — a  thing  not  without  value  either.'  f 

*  Ireland,'  says  Froude,  c  of  all  the  topics  on  which 
Carlyle  had  meditated  writing,  remained  painfully  fas- 
cinating. He  had  looked  at  the  beggarly  scene,  he 
had  seen  the  blighted  fields,  the  ragged  misery  of  the 
wretched  race  who  were  suffering  for  other's  sins  as 

*  Froude's  '  Life  in  London,'  vol.  i.  p.  441. 
+  Ibid.,  vol.  i.  p.  451. 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  99 

well  as  for  their  own.  Since  that  brief  visit  of  his,  the 
famine  had  been  followed  by  the  famine-fever,  and  the 
flight  of  millions  from  a  land  which  was  smitten  with  a 
curse.  Those  ardent  young  men  with  whom  he  had 
dined  at  Dundrum  were  working  as  felons  in  the  docks 
at  Bermuda.  Gavan  Duffy,  after  a  near  escape  from 
the  same  fate,  had  been  a  guest  in  Cheyne  Row ;  and 
the  story  which  he  had  to  tell  of  cabins  torn  down  by 
crowbars,  and  shivering  families,  turned  out  of  their 
miserable  homes,  dying  in  the  ditches  by  the  roadside, 
had  touched  Carlyle  to  the  very  heart.  He  was  furious 
at  the  economical  commonplaces  with  which  England 
was  consoling  itself.  He  regarded  Ireland  as  "the  break- 
ing-point of  the  huge  suppuration  which  all  British  and 
all  European  society  then  was.' "  *  Carlyle  paid  a  second 
visit  to  Ireland.  He  was  anxious  to  write  a  book  on 
the  subject.  He  noted  down  what  he  had  seen,  and 
'then  dismissed  the  unhappy  subject  from  his  mind/ 
giving  his  manuscript  to  a  friend,  which  was  published 
after  his  death. 

The  yth  of  August  found  Carlyle  among  his  cain 
folk  '  at  Scotsbrig,  and  this  was  his  soliloquy :  '  Thank 
Heaven  for  the  sight  of  real  human  industry,  with 
human  fruits  from  it,  once  more.  The  sight  of  fenced 
fields,  weeded  crops,  and  human  creatures  with  whole 
clothes  on  their  back — it  was  as  if  one  had  got  into 
spring  water  out  of  dunghill  puddles.'  Mrs  Carlyle 
*  Froude's  '  Life  in  London,'  vol.  i.  p.  456. 


ioo  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

had  also  gone  to  Scotland,  and  '  wandered  like  a 
returned  spirit  about  the  home  of  her  childhood.'  Of 
her  numerous  lively  letters,  room  must  be  found  for 
a  characteristic  epistle  to  her  brother-in-law,  John 
Carlyle.  His  translation  of  Dante's  Inferno  was  just 
out,  and  her  uncle's  family  at  Auchtertool  Manse,  in 
Fife,  where  she  was  staying,  were  busy  reading  and 
discussing  it.  '  We  had  been  talking  about  you,' 
she  says,  'and  had  sunk  silent.  Suddenly  my  uncle 
turned  his  head  to  me  and  said,  shaking  it  gravely, 
"He  has  made  an  awesome  plooster  o'  that  place." 
"Who?  What  place,  uncle?"  "Whew!  the  place 
ye'll  maybe  gang  to,  if  ye  dinna  tak'  care."  I  really 
believe  he  considers  all  those  circles  of  your  invention. 
Walter  [a  cousin,  just  ordained]  performed  the  marriage 
service  over  a  couple  of  colliers  the  day  after  I  came. 
I  happened  to  be  in  his  study  when  they  came  in,  and 
asked  leave  to  remain.  The  man  was  a  good-looking 
man  enough,  dreadfully  agitated,  partly  with  the  busi- 
ness he  was  come  on,  partly  with  drink.  He  had 
evidently  taken  a  glass  too  much  to  keep  his  heart  up. 
The  girl  had  one  very  large  inflamed  eye  and  one 
little  one,  which  looked  perfectly  composed,  while  the 
large  eye  stared  wildly,  and  had  a  tear  in  it.  Walter 
married  them  very  well  indeed ;  and  his  affecting  words, 
together  with  the  bridegroom's  pale,  excited  face,  and 
the  bride's  ugliness,  and  the  poverty,  penury,  and  want 
imprinted  on  the  whole  business,  and  above  all  fellow- 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  101 

feeling  with  the  poor  wretches  then  rushing  on  their 
fate — all  that  so  overcame  me  that  I  fell  crying  as 
desperately  as  if  I  had  been  getting  married  to  the 
collier  myself,  and,  when  the  ceremony  was  over,  ex- 
tended my  hand  to  the  unfortunates,  and  actually  (in 
such  an  enthusiasm  of  pity  did  I  find  myself)  I  pre- 
sented the  new  husband  with  a  snuff-box  which  I 
happened  to  have  in  my  hand,  being  just  about  pre- 
senting it  to  Walter  when  the  creatures  came  in.  This 
unexpected  Himmelsendung  finished  turning  the  man's 
head ;  he  wrung  my  hand  over  and  over,  leaving  his 
mark  for  some  hours  after,  and  ended  his  grateful 
speeches  with,  "  Oh,  Miss !  Oh,  Liddy  !  may  ye 
hae  mair  comfort  and  pleasure  in  your  life  than  ever 
you  have  had  yet ! "  which  might  easily  be.' 

Carlyle  was  full  of  wrath  at  what  he  considered 
the  cant  about  the  condition  of  the  wage-earners 
in  Manchester  and  elsewhere,  and  his  indignation 
found  vent  in  the  Latter-day  Pamphlets.  Froude 
once  asked  him  if  he  had  ever  thought  of  going 
into  Parliament,  for  the  former  knew  that  the  oppor- 
tunity must  have  been  offered  him.  '  Well,'  he  said, 
'I  did  think  of  it  at  the  time  of  the  "Latter-day 
Pamphlets."  I  felt  that  nothing  could  prevent  me  from 
getting  up  in  the  House  and  saying  all  that.'  *  He 
was  powerful,'  adds  Froude,  '  but  he  was  not  powerful 
enough  to  have  discharged  with  his  single  voice  the 
vast  volume  of  conventional  electricity  with  which  the 


102  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

collective  wisdom  of  the  nation  was,  and  remains 
charged.  It  is  better  that  his  thoughts  should  have 
been  committed  to  enduring  print,  where  they  remain 
to  be  reviewed  hereafter  by  the  light  of  fact.'  * 

The  printing  of  the  Pamphlets  commenced  at  the 
beginning  of  1850,  and  went  on  month  after  month, 
each  separately  published,  no  magazine  daring  to 
become  responsible  for  them.  When  the  Pamphlets 
appeared,  they  were  received  with  'astonished  indig- 
nation.' '  Carlyle  taken  to  whisky/  was  the  popular 
impression — or  perhaps  he  had  gone  mad.  'Punch,' 
says  Froude,  'the  most  friendly  to  him  of  all  the 
London  periodicals,  protested  affectionately.  The 
delinquent  was  brought  up  for  trial  before  him,  I  think 
for  injuring  his  reputation.  He  was  admonished,  but 
stood  impenitent,  and  even  "  called  the  worthy  magis- 
trate a  windbag  and  a  sham."  I  suppose  it  was 
Thackeray  who  wrote  this ;  or  some  other  kind 
friend,  who  feared,  like  Emerson,  "that  the  world 
would  turn  its  back  on  him."  He  was  under  no  illusion 
himself  as  to  the  effect  which  he  was  producing.'  t 

Amid  the  general  storm,  Carlyle  was  'agreeably 
surprised '  to  receive  an  invitation  to  dine  with  Peel 
at  Whitehall  Gardens,  where  he  met  a  select  company. 
'After  all  the  servants  but  the  butler  were  gone,' 
narrates  Carlyle,  '  we  began  to  hear  a  little  of  Peel's 

*  Froude's  '  Life  in  London,'  vol.  ii.  p.  26. 
t  Ibid.,  vol.  ii.  p.  36. 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  103 

quiet  talk  across  the  table,  unimportant,  distinguished 
by  its  sense  of  the  ludicrous  shining  through  a  strong 
official  rationality  and  even  seriousness  of  temper. 
Distracted  address  of  a  letter  from  somebody  to  Queen 
Victoria ;  "  The  most  noble  George  Victoria,  Queen  of 
England,  Knight  and  Baronet,"  or  something  like  that. 
A  man  had  once  written  to  Peel  himself,  while 
secretary,  "that  he  was  weary  of  life,  that  if  any 
gentleman  wanted  for  his  park-woods  a  hermit,  he, 
etc.",  all  of  which  was  very  pretty  and  human  as  Peel 
gave  it  us.'  *  Carlyle  was  driven  home  by  the  Bishop 
of  Oxford,  'Soapy  Sam*  Wilberforce,  whom  he  had 
probably  met  before  at  the  Ashburton's.  The  Bishop 
once  told  Froude  that  he  considered  Carlyle  a  most 
eminently  religious  man.  '  Ah,  Sam,'  said  Carlyle  to 
Froude  one  day,  '  he  is  a  very  clever  fellow ;  I  do  not 
hate  him  near  as  much  as  I  fear  I  ought  to  do.' 
Carlyle  and  Peel  met  once  more,  at  Bath  House, 
and  there,  too,  he  was  first  introduced  to  the  Duke  of 
Wellington.  Writing  at  the  time,  Carlyle  said :  '  I 
had  never  seen  till  now  how  beautiful,  and  what  an 
expression  of  graceful  simplicity,  veracity,  and  noble- 
ness there  is  about  the  old  hero  when  you  see  him  close 
at  hand.  .  .  .  Except  for  Dr  Chalmers,  I  have  not  for 
many  years  seen  so  beautiful  an  old  man.' 

Carlyle   intended,   some  time  or   other,   writing   a 
'  Life  of  Sterling,'  but  meanwhile  he  accepted  an  invi- 
*  Froude's  *  Life  in  London,'  vol.  ii.  p.  43, 


104  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

tation  to  visit  South  Wales.  Thence  he  made  his  way 
to  Scotsbrig.  On  the  2  yth  September  1 850,  he  '  parted 
sorrowfully  with  his  mother.'  When  he  reached  London, 
the  autumn  quarterlies  were  reviewing  the  Pamphlets, 
and  the  *  shrieking  tone  was  considerably  modified.' 
*A  review  of  them,'  says  Froude,  'by  Masson  in  the 
North  British  distinctly  pleased  Carlyle.  A  review  in 
the  Dublin  he  found  "excellently  serious,"  and  con- 
jectured that  it  came  from  some  Anglican  pervert  or 
convert.  It  was  written,  I  believe,  by  Dr  Ward.' 

After  a  few  more  wanderings,  Carlyle  set  about  the 
Life  of  Sterling,  and  on  April  5,  1851,  he  informs  his 
mother:  'I  told  the  Doctor  about  "John  Sterling's 
Life,"  a  small,  insignificant  book  or  pamphlet  I  have 
been  writing.  The  booksellers  got  it  away  from  me  the 
other  morning,  to  see  how  much  there  is  of  it,  in  the 
first  place.  I  know  not  altogether  myself  whether  it  is 
worth  printing  or  not,  but  rather  think  it  will  be  the  end 
of  it  whether  or  not.  It  has  cost  little  trouble,  and  need 
not  do  much  ill,  if  it  do  no  great  amount  of  good.' 
Another  visit  had  to  be  paid  to  Scotsbrig,  where  he 
read  the  "  Life  of  Chalmers."  *  An  excellent  Christian 
man,'  he  said.  'About  as  great  a  contrast  to  himself 
in  all  ways  as  could  be  found  in  these  epochs  under 
the  same  sky.' 

When  he  got  back  to  Cheyne  Row,  he  took  to  read- 
ing the  "Seven  Years'  War,"  with  a  view  to  another 
book.  He  determined  to  go  to  Germany,  and  on  August 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  105 

30,  1852,  Carlyle  embarked  'on  board  the  greasy  little 
wretch  of  a  Leith  steamer,  laden  to  the  water's  edge 
with  pig-iron  and  herrings.'  The  journey  over,  he  set 
to  work  on  'Frederick,'  but  was  driven  almost  to 
despair  by  the  cock-crowing  in  his  neighbourhood. 
Writing  to  Mrs  Carlyle,  he  says  :  *  I  foresee  in  general 
these  cocks  will  require  to  be  abolished,  entirely 
silenced,  whether  we  build  the  new  room  or  not.  I 
would  cheerfully  shoot  them,  and  pay  the  price  if 
discovered,  but  I  have  no  gun,  should  be  unsafe 
for  hitting,  and  indeed  seldom  see  the  wretched 
animals.' 

He  took  refuge  at  the  Ashburton's  house,  the 
Grange,  but  on  the  2oth  of  December,  news  came 
that  his  mother  was  seriously  ill,  and  could  not  last 
long.  He  hurried  off  to  Scotsbrig,  and  reached  there 
in  time  to  see  her  once  more  alive.  In  his  journal, 
this  passage  is  to  be  found  under  date  January 
8,  1854:  'The  stroke  has  fallen.  My  dear  old 
mother  is  gone  from  me,  and  in  the  winter  of  the 
year,  confusedly  under  darkness  of  weather  and  of 
mind,  the  stern  final  epoch — epoch  of  old  age  —  is 

beginning   to   unfold   itself  for   me It   is 

matter  of  perennial  thankfulness  to  me,  and  beyond 
my  desert  in  that  matter  very  far,  that  I  found  my  dear 
old  mother  still  alive;  able  to  recognise  me  with  a 
faint  joy;  her  former  self  still  strangely  visible  there  in 
all  its  lineaments,  though  worn  to  the  uttermost  thread. 


106  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

The  brave  old  mother  and  the  good,  whom  to  lose  had 
been  my  fear  ever  since  intelligence  awoke  in  me  in 

this  world,  arrived  now  at  the  final  bourn She 

was  about  84  years  of  age,  and  could  not  with  advan- 
tage to  any  side  remain  with  us  longer.  Surely  it  was 
a  good  Power  that  gave  us  such  a  mother ;  and  good 
though  stern  that  took  her  away  from  amid  such  grief 
and  labour  by  a  death  beautiful  to  one's  thoughts. 
"  All  the  days  of  my  appointed  time  will  I  wait  till  my 
change  come."  This  they  heard  her  muttering,  and 
many  other  less  frequent  pious  texts  and  passages. 
Amen,  Amen!  Sunday,  December  25,  1853 — a  day 

henceforth  for  ever  memorable  to  me To  live  for 

the  shorter  or  longer  remainder  of  my  days  with  the 
simple  bravery,  veracity,  and  piety  of  her  that  is  gone : 
that  would  be  a  right  learning  from  her  death,  and  a 
right  honouring  of  her  memory.  But  alas  all  is  yet 
frozen  within  me ;  even  as  it  is  without  me  at  present, 
and  I  have  made  little  or  no  way.  God  be  helpful  to 
me  !  I  myself  am  very  weak,  confused,  fatigued, 
entangled  in  poor  worldlinesses  too.  Newspaper  para- 
graphs, even  as  this  sacred  and  peculiar  thing,  are  not 
indifferent  to  me.  Weak  soul !  and  I  am  fifty-eight 
years  old,  and  the  tasks  I  have  on  hand,  Frederick, 
&c.,  are  most  ungainly,  incongruous  with  my  mood — 
and  the  night  cometh,  for  me  too  is  not  distant,  which 
for  her  is  come.  I  must  try,  I  must  try.  Poor  brother 
Jack  !  Will  he  do  his  Dante  now  ?  For  him  also  I  am 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  107 

sad ;  and  surely  he  has  deserved  gratitude  in  these  last 
years  from  us  all.'  * 

When  he  returned  to  London,  Carlyle  lived  in  strict 
seclusion,  making  repeated  efforts  at  work  on  what  he 
called  'the  unexecutable  book,'  Frederick.  In  the 
spring  of  1854,  tidings  reached  Carlyle  of  the  death  of 
Professor  Wilson.  Between  them  there  had  never 
been  any  cordial  relation,  says  Froude.  *  They  had 
met  in  Edinburgh  in  the  old  days ;  on  Carlyle's  part 
there  had  been  no  backwardness,  and  Wilson  was  not 
unconscious  of  Carlyle's  extraordinary  powers.  But  he 
had  been  shy  of  Carlyle,  and  Carlyle  had  resented  it, 
and  now  this  April  the  news  came  that  Wilson  was 
gone,  and  Carlyle  had  to  write  his  epitaph.  1 1  knew 
his  figure  well/  wrote  Carlyle  in  his  journal  on  April 
29  ;  'remember  well  first  seeing  him  in  Princes  Street 
on  a  bright  April  afternoon — probably  1814 — exactly 
forty  years  ago.  ...  A  tall  ruddy  figure,  with  plenteous 
blonde  hair,  with  bright  blue  eyes,  fixed,  as  if  in  haste 
towards  some  distant  object,  strode  rapidly  along, 
clearing  the  press  to  the  left  of  us,  close  by  the 
railings,  near  where  Blackwood's  shop  now  is.  West- 
ward he  in  haste;  we  slowly  eastward.  Campbell 
whispered  me,  "  That  is  Wilson  of  the  Isle  of  Palms," 
which  poem  I  had  not  read,  being  then  quite  mathe- 
matical, scientific,  &c.,  for  extraneous  reasons,  as  I  now 
see  them  to  have  been.  The  broad-shouldered  stately 
*  Froude's  '  Life  in  London,'  vol.  ii.  pp.  142-45. 


io8  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

bulk  of  the  man  struck  me ;  his  flashing  eye,  copious, 
dishevelled  head  of  hair,  and  rapid,  unconcerned  pro- 
gress, like  that  of  a  plough  through  stubble.  I  really 
liked  him,  but  only  from  the  distance,  and  thought  no 
more  of  him.  It  must  have  been  fourteen  years  later 
before  I  once  saw  his  figure  again,  and  began  to  have 
some  distant  straggling  acquaintance  of  a  personal 
kind  with  him.  Glad  could  I  have  been  to  be  better 
and  more  familiarly  acquainted ;  but  though  I  liked 
much  in  him,  and  he  somewhat  in  me,  it  would  not  do. 
He  was  always  very  kind  to  me,  but  seemed  to  have 
a  feeling  I  should — could — not  become  wholly  his, 
in  which  he  was  right,  and  that  on  other  terms  he 
could  not  have  me ;  so  we  let  it  so  remain,  and  for  many 
years — indeed,  even  after  quitting  Edinburgh — I  had 
no  acquaintance  with  him  ;  occasionally  got  symptoms 
of  his  ill-humour  with  me — ink-spurts  in  Blackwood, 
read  or  heard  of,  which  I,  in  a  surly,  silent  manner, 

strove  to  consider  flattering  rather So  far  as  I 

can  recollect,  he  was  once  in  my  house  (Comely 
Bank,  with  a  testimonial,  poor  fellow !),  and  I  once 
in  his,  De  Quincey,  &c.,  a  little  while  one  after- 
noon.' * 

On  September  16,  1854,  Carlyle  breaks  out  in  his 

journal :  * "  The  harvest  is  past,  the  summer  is  ended, 

and    we  are  not  saved." '     What  a  fearful  word  !     I 

cannot  find  how  to  take  up  that  miserable  "  Frederick," 

*  Froude's  *  Life  in  London,'  vol.  ii.  pp.  156-7. 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  109 

or  what  on  earth  to  do  with  it.'  He  worked  hard  at  it, 
nevertheless,  for  eighteen  months,  and  by  the  end  of 
May  1858,  the  first  instalment  was  all  in  type.  Froude 
remarks  that  a  fine  critic  once  said  to  him  that  Carlyle's 
Friedrich  Wilhelm  was  as  peculiar  and  original  as 
Sterne's  Tristram  Shandy ;  certainly  as  distinct  a  per- 
sonality as  exists  in  English  fiction.  Carlyle  made  a 
second  journey  to  Germany.  Shortly  after  his  return, 
the  already  finished  volumes  of  Frederick  appeared,  and 
they  met  with  an  immediate  welcome.  The  success 
was  great;  2000  copies  were  sold  at  the  first  issue,  and 
a  second  2000  were  disposed  of  almost  as  rapidly,  and 
a  third  2000  followed.  Mrs  Carlyle's  health  being  un- 
satisfactory, Carlyle  took  a  house  for  the  summer  at 
Humbie,  near  Aberdour  in  Fife.  They  returned  to 
Cheyne  Row  in  October,  neither  of  them  benefited  by 
their  holiday  in  the  north. 

While  many  of  Carlyle's  intimate  friends  were  pass- 
ing away,  he  formed  Ruskin's  acquaintance,  which 
turned  out  mutually  satisfactory.  On  the  23rd  April 
1 86 1,  Carlyle  writes  to  his  brother  John  :  '  Friday  last  I 
was  persuaded — in  fact  had  unwarily  compelled  myself, 
as  it  were — to  a  lecture  of  Ruskin's  at  the  Institution, 
Albemarle  Street.  Lecture  on  Tree  Leaves  as  physio- 
logical, pictorial,  moral,  symbolical  objects.  A  crammed 
house,  but  tolerable  to  me  even  in  the  gallery.  The 
lecture  was  thought  to  "  break  down,"  and  indeed  it 
quite  did  "  as  a  lecture  " ;  but  only  did  from  embarras 


no  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

des  richesses — a  rare  case.  Ruskin  did  blow  asunder 
as  by  gunpowder  explosions  his  leaf  notions,  which 
were  manifold,  curious,  genial ;  and,  in  fact,  I  do  not 
recollect  to  have  heard  in  that  place  any  neatest  thing 
I  liked  so  well  as  this  chaotic  one.'  * 

Frederick  was  progressing,  though  slowly,  as  he 
found  the  ore  in  the  German  material  at  his  disposal 
"  nowhere  smelted  out  of  it."  The  third  volume  was 
finished  and  published  in  the  summer  of  1862  ;  the 
fourth  volume  was  getting  into  type ;  and  the  fifth  and 
last  was  finished  in  January  1865.  'It  nearly  killed 
me,'  Carlyle  writes  in  his  journal,  'it,  and  my  poor 
Jane's  dreadful  illness,  now  happily  over.  No  sym- 
pathy could  be  found  on  earth  for  those  horrid 
struggles  of  twelve  years,  nor  happily  was  any  needed. 
On  Sunday  evening  in  the  end  of  January  (1865) 
I  walked  out,  with  the  multiplex  feeling — joy  not 
very  prominent  in  it,  but  a  kind  of  solemn  thankful- 
ness traceable,  that  I  had  written  the  last  sentence 
of  that  unutterable  book,  and,  contrary  to  many 
forebodings  in  bad  hours,  had  actually  got  done  with 
it  for  ever.' 

In  England  it  was  at  once  admitted,  says  Froude, 
that  a  splendid  addition  had  been  made  to  the  national 
literature.  'The  book  contained,  if  nothing  else,  a 
gallery  of  historical  figures  executed  with  a  skill  which 
placed  Carlyle  at  the  head  of  literary  portrait  painters. 
*  Froude's  '  Life  in  London,'  vol.  ii.  p.  245. 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  in 

...  No  critic,  after  the  completion  of  Frederick, 
challenged  Carlyle's  right  to  a  place  beside  the  greatest 
of  English  authors,  past  or  present.'  The  work  was 
translated  instantly  into  German,  calling  forth  the 
warmest  appreciation. 


CHAPTER  VI 

RECTORIAL   ADDRESS DEATH   OF    MRS   CARLYLE 

AFTER  a  round  of  holiday  visits,  including  one  to 
Annandale,  the  Carlyles  settled  down  once  more  at 
Cheyne  Row  in  the  summer  of  1865.  'The  great 
outward  event  of  Carlyle's  own  life,'  observes  Froude, 
'  Scotland's  public  recognition  of  him,  was  now  lying 
close  ahead.  This  his  wife  was  to  live  to  witness  as 
her  final  happiness  in  this  world.'  Here  is  an  eloquent 
passage  from  the  same  pen:  'I  had  been  at  Edin- 
burgh,' writes  Froude,  '  and  had  heard  Gladstone  make 
his  great  oration  on  Homer  there,  on  retiring  from 
office  as  Rector.  It  was  a  grand  display.  I  never 
recognised  before  what  oratory  could  do ;  the  audience 
being  kept  for  three  hours  in  a  state  of  electric  tension, 
bursting  every  moment  into  applause.  Nothing  was  said 
which  seemed  of  moment  when  read  deliberately  after- 
wards ;  but  the  voice  was  like  enchantment,  and  the 
street,  when  we  left  the  building,  was  ringing  with  a 
prolongation  of  cheers.  Perhaps  in  all  Britain  there 
was  not  a  man  whose  views  on  all  subjects,  in  heaven 
and  earth,  less  resembled  Gladstone's  than  those  of 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  113 

the  man  whom  this  same  applauding  multitude  elected 
to  take  his  place.  The  students  too,  perhaps,  were 
ignorant  how  wide  the  contradiction  was ;  but  if  they 
had  been  aware  of  it  they  need  not  have  acted  differ- 
ently. Carlyle  had  been  one  of  themselves.  He  had 
risen  from  among  them — not  by  birth  or  favour,  not  on 
the  ladder  of  any  established  profession,  but  only  by 
the  internal  force  that  was  in  him — to  the  highest 
place  as  a  modern  man  of  letters.  In  Frederick  he 
had  given  the  finish  to  his  reputation ;  he  stood  now 
at  the  summit  of  his  fame ;  and  the  Edinburgh  students 
desired  to  mark  their  admiration  in  some  signal  way. 
He  had  been  mentioned  before,  but  he  had  declined 
to  be  nominated,  for  a  party  only  were  then  in  his 
favour.  On  this  occasion,  the  students  were  unanimous, 
or  nearly  so.  His  own  consent  was  all  that  was  want- 
ing.'* This  consent  was  obtained,  and  Carlyle  was 
chosen  Rector  of  Edinburgh  University.  But  the 
Address  troubled  him.  He  resolved,  however,  as  his 
father  used  to  say,  to  '  gar  himself  go  through  with  the 
thing,'  or  at  least  to  try.  Froude  says  he  was  very 
miserable,  but  that  Mrs  Carlyle  'kept  up  his  spirits, 
made  fun  of  his  fears,  bantered  him,  encouraged  him, 
herself  at  heart  as  much  alarmed  as  he  was,  but  con- 
scious, too,  of  the  ridiculous  side  of  it.1  She  thought 
of  accompanying  him,  but  her  health  would  not  permit 
of  the  effort.  Both  Huxley  and  Tyndall  were  going 
*  Froude's  '  Life  in  London,'  vol.  ii.  p.  295. 


ii4  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

down,  and  Tyndall  promised  Mrs  Carlyle  to  take  care 
of  her  husband. 

On  Monday  morning,  the  2Qth  of  March,  1866, 
Carlyle  and  his  wife  parted.  *  The  last  I  saw  of  her,' 
he  said,  '  was  as  she  stood  with  her  back  to  the  parlour 
door  to  bid  me  good-bye.  She  kissed  me  twice,  she 
me  once,  I  her  a  second  time.'  They  parted  for  ever. 

Edinburgh  was  reached  in  due  course,  and  what 
happened  there  had  best  be  told  by  an  eye-witness, 
Professor  Masson.  *  On  the  night  following  Carlyle's 
arrival  in  town,'  he  says,  '  after  he  had  settled  himself 
in  Mr  Erskine  of  Linlathen's  house,  where  he  was  to 
stay  during  his  visit,  he  and  his  brother  John  came  to 
my  house  in  Rosebery  Crescent,  that  they  might  have 
a  quiet  smoke  and  talk  over  matters.  They  sat  with 
me  an  hour  or  more,  Carlyle  as  placid  and  hearty  as 
could  be,  talking  most  pleasantly,  a  little  dubious, 
indeed,  as  to  how  he  might  get  through  his  Address, 
but  for  the  rest  unperturbed.  As  to  the  Address  itself, 
when  the  old  man  stood  up  in  the  Music  Hall  before 
the  assembled  crowd,  and  threw  off  his  Rectorial  robes, 
and  proceeded  to  speak,  slowly,  connectedly,  and  nobly 
raising  his  left  hand  at  the  end  of  each  section  or  para- 
graph to  stroke  the  back  of  his  head  as  he  cogitated 
what  he  was  to  say  next,  the  crowd  listening  as  they 
had  never  listened  to  a  speaker  before,  and  reverent 
even  in  those  parts  of  the  hall  where  he  was  least 
audible, — who  that  was  present  will  ever  forget  that 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  115 

sight  ?  That  day,  and  on  the  subsequent  days  of  his 
stay,  there  were,  of  course,  dinners  and  other  gather- 
ings in  Carlyle's  honour.  One  such  dinner,  followed 
by  a  larger  evening  gathering,  was  in  my  house.  Then, 
too,  he  was  in  the  best  of  possible  spirits,  courteous  in 
manner  and  in  speech  to  all,  and  throwing  himself 
heartily  into  whatever  turned  up.  At  the  dinner- 
table,  I  remember,  Lord  Neaves  favoured  us  with  one 
or  two  of  his  humorous  songs  or  recitatives,  includ- 
ing his  clever  quiz  called  "  Stuart  Mill  on  Mind  and 
Matter,"  written  to  the  tune  of  "  Roy's  wife  of  Aldival- 
loch."  No  one  enjoyed  the  thing  more  than  Carlyle ; 
and  he  surprised  me  by  doing  what  I  had  never  heard 
him  do  before, — actually  joining  with  his  own  voice  in 
the  chorus.  "  Stuart  Mill  on  Mind  and  Matter,  Stuart 
Mill  on  Mind  and  Matter,"  he  chaunted  laughingly 
along  with  Lord  Neaves  every  time  the  chorus  came 
round,  beating  time  in  the  air  emphatically  with  his 
fist.  It  was  hardly  otherwise,  or  only  otherwise  inas- 
much as  the  affair  was  more  ceremonious  and  stately, 
at  the  dinner  given  to  him  in  the  Douglas  Hotel  by 
the  Senatus  AcademicUs,  and  in  which  his  old  friend 
Sir  David  Brewster  presided.  There,  too,  while 
dignified  and  serene,  Carlyle  was  thoroughly  sym- 
pathetic and  convivial.  Especially  I  remember  how 
he  relished  and  applauded  the  songs  of  our  academic 
laureate  and  matchless  chief  in  such  things,  Professor 
Douglas  Maclagan,  and  how,  before  we  broke  up,  he 


n6  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

expressly  complimented  Professor  Maclagan  on  having 
"  contributed  so  greatly  to  the  hilarity  of  the  evening." '  * 

The  most  graphic  account  of  Carlyle's  installation  as 
Lord  Rector  is  that  by  Alexander  Smith,  the  author  of 
'A  Life  Drama/  'Summer  in  Skye/  &c.,  &c.,  whose 
lamented  death  took  place  a  few  months  after  that  event. 
c  Curious  stories/  he  wrote,  c  are  told  of  the  eagerness 
on  every  side  manifested  to  hear  Mr  Carlyle.  Country 
clergymen  from  beyond  Aberdeen  came  to  Edinburgh 
for  the  sole  purpose  of  hearing  and  seeing.  Gentlemen 
came  down  from  London  by  train  the  night  before,  and 
returned  to  London  by  train  the  night  after.  Nay,  it 
was  even  said  that  an  enthusiast,  dwelling  in  the  remote 
west  of  Ireland,  intimated  to  the  officials  who  had  charge 
of  the  distribution,  that  if  a  ticket  should  be  reserved 
for  him,  he  would  gladly  come  the  whole  way  to  Edin- 
burgh. Let  us  hope  a  ticket  was  reserved.  On  the 
day  of  the  address,  the  doors  of  the  Music  Hall  were 
besieged  long  before  the  hour  of  opening  had  arrived ; 
and  loitering  about  there  on  the  outskirts  of  the  crowd, 
one  could  not  help  glancing  curiously  down  Pitt  Street, 
towards  the  "  lang  toun  of  Kirkcaldy,"  dimly  seen  be- 
yond the  Forth ;  for  on  the  sands  there,  in  the  early 
years  of  the  century,  Edward  Irving  was  accustomed 
to  pace  up  and  down  solitarily,  and  "as  if  the  sands 
were  his  own,"  people  say,  who  remember,  when  they 
were  boys,  seeing  the  tall,  ardent,  black-haired,  swift- 

*  Masson's  '  Carlyle  Personally  and  in  his  Writings/  pp.  27-9. 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  117 

gestured,  squinting  man,  often  enough.  And  to  Kirk- 
caldy,  too,  ....  came  young  Carlyle  from  Edinburgh 
College,  wildly  in  love  with  German  and  mathematics ; 
and  the  schoolroom  in  which  these  men  taught, 
although  incorporated  in  Provost  Swan's  manufactory, 
is  yet  kept  sacred  and  intact,  and  but  little  changed 
these  fifty  years — an  act  of  hero-worship  for  which  the 
present  and  other  generations  may  be  thankful.  It 
seemed  to  me  that  so  glancing  Fife-wards,  and  thinking 
of  that  noble  friendship — of  the  David  and  Jonathan 
of  so  many  years  agone — was  the  best  preparation  for 
the  man  I  was  to  see,  and  the  speech  I  was  to  hear. 
David  and  Jonathan  !  Jonathan  stumbled  and  fell 
on  the  dark  hills,  not  of  Gilboa,  but  of  Vanity ;  and 
David  sang  his  funeral  song  :  "  But  for  him  I  had 
never  known  what  the  communion  of  man  with  man 
means.  His  was  the  freest,  brotherliest,  bravest  human 
soul  mine  ever  came  in  contact  with.  I  call  him,  on 
the  whole,  the  best  man  I  have  ever,  after  trial  enough, 
found  in  this  world,  or  now  hope  to  find." 

1  In  a  very  few  minutes  after  the  doors  were  opened, 
the  large  hall  was  filled  in  every  part ;  and  when  up 
the  central  passage  the  Principal,  the  Lord  Rector, 
the  Members  of  the  Senate,  and  other  gentlemen 
advanced  towards  the  platform,  the  cheering  was  voci- 
ferous and  hearty.  The  Principal  occupied  the  chair, 
of  course;  the  Lord  Rector  on  his  right,  the  Lord 
Provost  on  his  left.  When  the  platform  gentlemen 


n8  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

had  taken  their  seats,  every  eye  was  fixed  on  the 
Rector.  To  all  appearance,  as  he  sat,  time  and  labour 
had  dealt  tenderly  with  him.  His  face  had  not  yet 
lost  the  country  bronze  which  he  brought  up  with 
him  from  Dumfriesshire  as  a  student,  fifty-six  years 
ago.  His  long  residence  in  London  had  not  touched 
his  Annandale  look,  nor  had  it — as  we  soon  learned — 
touched  his  Annandale  accent.  His  countenance  was 
striking,  homely,  sincere,  truthful — the  countenance  of 
a  man  on  whom  "the  burden  of  the  unintelligible 
world  "  had  weighed  more  heavily  than  on  most.  His 
hair  was  yet  almost  dark ;  his  moustache  and  short 
beard  were  iron-grey.  His  eyes  were  wide,  melan- 
choly, sorrowful ;  and  seemed  as  if  they  had  been  at 
times  a-weary  of  the  sun.  Altogether,  in  his  aspect 
there  was  something  aboriginal,  as  of  a  piece  of 
unhewn  granite,  which  had  never  been  polished  to 
any  approved  pattern,  whose  natural  and  original 
vitality  had  never  been  tampered  with.  In  a  word, 
there  seemed  no  passivity  about  Mr  Carlyle;  he 
was  the  diamond,  and  the  world  was  his  pane  of  glass ; 
he  was  a  graving  tool,  rather  than  a  thing  graven  upon 
— a  man  to  set  his  mark  on  the  world — a  man  on 

whom  the  world  could  not  set  its  mark The 

proceedings  began  by  the  conferring  of  the  degree  of 
LL.D.  on  Mr  Erskine  of  Linlathen — an  old  friend  of 
Mr  Carlyle's — on  Professors  Huxley,  Tyndall,  and 
Ramsay,  and  on  Dr  Rae,  the  Arctic  explorer.  That 


THOMAS  CARLYLE 


done,  amid  a  tempest  of  cheering  and  hats  enthusias- 
tically waved,  Mr  Carlyle,  slipping  off  his  Rectorial 
robe  —  which  must  have  been  a  very  shirt  of  Nessus  to 
him  —  advanced  to  the  table,  and  began  to  speak  in 
low,  wavering,  melancholy  tones,  which  were  in  accord- 
ance with  the  melancholy  eyes,  and  in  the  Annandale 
accent  with  which  his  play-fellows  must  have  been 
familiar  long  ago.  So  self-centred  was  he,  so  impreg- 
nable to  outward  influences,  that  all  his  years  of  Edin- 
burgh and  London  life  could  not  impair,  even  in  the 
slightest  degree,  that.  The  opening  sentences  were  lost 
in  the  applause,  and  when  it  subsided,  the  low,  plaintive, 
quavering  voice  was  heard  going  on  :  "Your  enthusiasm 
towards  me  is  very  beautiful  in  itself,  however  undeserved 
it  may  be  in  regard  to  the  object  of  it.  It  is  a  feeling 
honourable  to  all  men,  and  one  well  known  to  myself 
when  in  a  position  analogous  to  your  own."  And  then 
came  the  Carlylean  utterance,  with  its  far-reaching 
reminiscence  and  sigh  over  old  graves  —  Father's  and 
Mother's,  Edward  Irving's,  John  Sterling's,  Charles 
Buller's,  and  all  the  noble  known  in  past  time  —  and 
with  its  flash  of  melancholy  scorn.  "There  are  now  fifty- 
six  years  gone,  last  November,  since  I  first  entered  your 
city,  a  boy  of  not  quite  fourteen  —  fifty-six  years  ago  —  to 
attend  classes  here,  and  gain  knowledge  of  all  kinds,  I 
knew  not  what  —  with  feelings  of  wonder  and  awe-struck 
expectation  ;  and  now,  after  a  long,  long  course,  this 
is  what  we  have  come  to.  ...  There  is  something 


iso  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

touching  and  tragic,  and  yet  at  the  same  time  beautiful, 
to  see  the  third  generation,  as  it  were,  of  my  dear  old 
native  land,  rising  up,  and  saying :  Well,  you  are  not 
altogether  an  unworthy  labourer  in  the  vineyard.  You 
have  toiled  through  a  great  variety  of  fortunes,  and 
have  had  many  judges."  And  thereafter,  without  aid 
of  notes,  or  paper  preparation  of  any  kind,  in  the  same 
wistful,  earnest,  hesitating  voice,  and  with  many  a 
touch  of  quaint  humour  by  the  way,  which  came  in 
upon  his  subject  like  glimpses  of  pleasant  sunshine, 
the  old  man  talked  to  his  vast  audience  about  the 
origin  and  function  of  Universities,  the  Old  Greeks  and 
Romans,  Oliver  Cromwell,  John  Knox,  the  excellence 
of  silence  as  compared  with  speech,  the  value  of 
courage  and  truthfulness,  and  the  supreme  importance 
of  taking  care  of  one's  health.  "  There  is  no  kind  of 
achievement  you  could  make  in  the  world  that  is  equal 
to  perfect  health.  What  to  it  are  nuggets  and  millions? 
The  French  financier  said,  '  Alas  !  why  is  there  no 
sleep  to  be  sold?'  Sleep  was  not  in  the  market  at 
any  quotation."  But  what  need  of  quoting  a  speech 
which  by  this  time  has  been  read  by  everybody  ? 
Appraise  it  as  ypu  please,  it  was  a  thing  per  se.  Just 
as,  if  you  wish  a  purple  dye,  you  must  fish  up  the 
Murex ;  if  you  wish  ivory,  you  must  go  to  the  East ; 
so  if  you  desire  an  address  such  as  Edinburgh  listened 
to  the  other  day,  you  must  go  to  Chelsea  for  it.  It 
may  not  be  quite  to  your  taste,  but,  in  any  case,  there 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  12 1 

is  no  other  intellectual  warehouse  in  which  that  kind  of 
article  is  kept  in  stock.'  * 

Another  eye-witness,  Mr  Moncure  D.  Con  way,  says : 
1  When  Carlyle  sat  down  there  was  an  audible  sound, 
as  of  breath  long  held,  by  all  present ;  then  a  cry  from 
the  students,  an  exultation ;  they  rose  up,  all  arose, 
waving  their  arms  excitedly ;  some  pressed  forward,  as 
if  wishing  to  embrace  him,  or  to  clasp  his  knees ;  others 
were  weeping ;  what  had  been  heard  that  day  was  more 
than  could  be  reported  ;  it  was  the  ineffable  spirit  that 
went  forth  from  the  deeps  of  a  great  heart  and  from  the 
ages  stored  up  in  it,  and  deep  answered  unto  deep/ 

Immediately  after  the  delivery  of  the  address,  Tyn- 
dall  telegraphed  to  Mrs  Carlyle  this  brief  message,  'A 
perfect  triumph.'  That  evening  she  dined  at  Forster's, 
where  she  met  Dickens  and  Wilkie  Collins.  They 
drank  Carlyle's  health,  and  to  her  it  was  '  a  good  joy.' 
It  was  Carlyle's  intention  to  have  returned  at  once  to 
London,  but  he  changed  his  mind,  and  went  for  a  few 
quiet  days  at  Scotsbrig.  When  Tyndall  was  back  in 
London  Mrs  Carlyle  got  all  the  particulars  of  the 
rectorial  address  from  him,  and  was  made  perfectly 
happy  about  it. 

Numberless   congratulations   poured   in   upon  Mrs 

Carlyle,  and  for  Saturday,  April  2ist,  she  had  arranged 

a  small  tea-party.     In  the  morning  she  wrote  her  daily 

letter  to  Carlyle,  and  in  the  afternoon  she  went  out  in 

*  Alexander  Smith's  'Sketches  and  Criticisms,'  pp.  101-8. 


122  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

her  brougham  for  a  drive,  taking  her  little  dog  with 
her.  When  near  Victoria  Gate,  Hyde  Park,  she  put 
the  dog  out  to  run.  *  A  passing  carriage/  says 
Froude,  '  went  over  its  foot  .....  She  sprang  out, 
caught  the  dog  in  her  arms,  took  it  with  her  into  the 
brougham,  and  was  never  more  seen  alive.  The 
coachman  went  twice  round  the  drive,  by  Marble  Arch 
down  to  Stanhope  Gate,  along  the  Serpentine  and 
round  again.  Coming  a  second  time  near  to  the 
Achilles  statue,  and  surprised  to  receive  no  directions, 
he  turned  round,  saw  indistinctly  that  something  was 
wrong,  and  asked  a  gentleman  near  to  look  into  the 
carriage.  The  gentleman  told  him  briefly  to  take  the 
lady  to  St.  George's  Hospital,  which  was  not  200  yards 
distant.  She  was  sitting  with  her  hands  folded  in  her 


At  the  hour  she  died  Carlyle  was  enjoying  the 
1  green  solitudes  and  fresh  spring  breezes  '  of  Annan- 
dale,  'quietly  but  far  from  happily.'  About  nine 
o'clock  the  same  night  his  brother-in-law,  Mr  Aitken, 
broke  the  news  to  him.  '  I  was  sitting  in  sister  Jean's 
at  Dumfries,'  Carlyle  wrote  a  fortnight  after,  '  thinking 
of  my  railway  journey  to  Chelsea  on  Monday,  and 
perhaps  of  a  sprained  ankle  I  had  got  at  Scotsbrig 
two  weeks  or  so  before,  when  the  fatal  telegrams,  two 
of  them  in  succession,  came.  It  had  a  kind  of  stun- 
ning effect  upon  me.  Not  for  above  two  days  could  I 
*  Froude's  '  Life  in  London,'  vol.  ii.  p.  312. 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  123 

estimate  the  immeasurable  depths  of  it,  or  the  infinite 
sorrow  which  had  peeled  my  life  all  bare,  and  in  a 
moment  shattered  my  poor  world  to  universal  ruin. 
They  took  me  out  next  day  to  wander,  as  was  medi- 
cally needful,  in  the  green  sunny  Sabbath  fields,  and 
ever  and  anon  there  rose  from  my  sick  heart  the  ejacu- 
lation, "  My  poor  little  woman ! "  but  no  full  gust  of 
tears  came  to  my  relief,  nor  has  yet  come.  Will  it 
ever  ?  A  stony  "  Woe's  me,  woe's  me  ! "  sometimes 
with  infinite  tenderness  and  pity,  not  for  myself,  is  my 
habitual  mood  hitherto.'  * 

On  Monday  morning  Carlyle  and  his  brother  John 
set  off  for  London.  On  the  Wednesday  he  was  on  his 
way  to  Haddington  with  the  remains,  his  brother  and 
John  Forster  accompanying  him.  At  i  P.M.  on  Thurs- 
day the  funeral  took  place.  *  In  the  nave  of  the  old 
Abbey  Kirk,'  wrote  her  disconsolate  husband,  *  long  a 
ruin,  now  being  saved  from  further  decay,  with  the 
skies  looking  down  on  her,  there  sleeps  my  little 
Jeannie,  and  the  light  of  her  face  will  never  shine 
on  me  more,'  When  Mr  Con  way  saw  him  on  his 
return  to  Cheyne  Row,  Carlyle  said,  'Whatever 
triumph  there  may  have  been  in  that  now  so  darkly 
overcast  day,  was  indeed  hers.  Long,  long  years  ago, 
she  took  her  place  by  the  side  of  a  poor  man  of 
humblest  condition,  against  all  other  provisions  for 
her,  undertook  to  share  his  lot  for  weal  or  woe ;  and 
*  Froude's  '  Life  in  London,'  vol.  ii.  p.  314. 


124  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

in  that  office  what  she  has  been  to  him  and  done  for 
him,  how  she  has  placed,  as  it  were,  velvet  between  him 
and  all  the  sharp  angularities  of  existence,  remains  now 
only  in  the  knowledge  of  one  man,  and  will  presently 
be  finally  hid  in  his  grave.'  As  he  touchingly  expressed 
it  in  the  beautiful  epitaph  he  wrote,  the  '  light  of  his 
life*  had  assuredly  'gone  out.'  Universal  sympathy 
was  felt  for  the  bereaved  husband,  and  he  was  very 
much  affected  by  '  a  delicate,  graceful,  and  even  affec- 
tionate '  message  from  the  Queen,  conveyed  by  Lady 
Augusta  Stanley  through  his  brother  John. 

One  who  knew  Mrs  Carlyle  intimately  thus  speaks 
of  her :  '  Her  intellect  was  as  clear  and  incisive  as  his, 
yet  altogether  womanly  in  character ;  her  heart  was  as 
truthful,  and  her  courage  as  unswerving.  She  was  a 
wife  in  the  noblest  sense  of  that  sacred  name.  She 
had  a  gift  of  literary  expression  as  unique  as  his; 
as  tender  a  sympathy  with  human  sorrow  and  need ; 
as  clear  an  eye  for  all  conventional  hypocrisies  and 
folly ;  as  vivid  powers  of  description  and  illustration ; 
and  also,  it  must  be  confessed,  when  the  spirit  of 
mockery  was  strong  upon  her,  as  keen  an  edge  to  her 
flashing  wit  and  humour,  and  as  scornful  a  disregard  of 
the  conventional  proprieties.  But  she  was  no  literary 
hermaphrodite.  She  never  intellectually  strode  forth 
before  the  world  upon  masculine  stilts ;  nor,  in  private 
life,  did  she  frowardly  push  to  the  front,  in  the  vanity 
of  showing  she  was  as  clever  and  considerable  as  her 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  125 

husband.  She  longed,  with  a  true  woman's  longing 
heart,  to  be  appreciated  by  him,  and  by  those  she 
loved;  and,  for  her,  all  extraneous  applause  might 
whistle  with  the  wind.  But  if  her  husband  was  a  king 
in  literature,  so  might  she  have  been  a  queen.  Her 
influence  with  him  for  good  cannot  be  questioned  by 
any  one  having  eyes  to  discern.  And  if  she  sacrificed 
her  own  vanity  for  personal  distinction,  in  order  to 
make  his  work  possible  for  him,  who  shall  say  she  did 
not  choose  the  nobler  and  better  part  ? '  * 

On  the  other  hand,  Carlyle  was  too  exacting,  and 
when  domestic  differences  arose  he  abstained  from 
paying  those  little  attentions  which  a  delicate  and 
sensitive  woman  might  naturally  expect  from  a  hus- 
band who  was  so  lavish  of  terms  of  endearment  in 
the  letters  he  wrote  to  her  when  away  from  her  side. 
'Even  with  that  mother  whom  he  so  dearly  loved,' 
observes  Mrs  Ireland,  'the  intercourse  was  mainly 
composed  of  a  silent  sitting  by  the  fireside  of  an 
evening  in  the  old  "  houseplace,"  with  a  tranquillising 
pipe  of  tobacco,  or  of  his  returning  from  his  long 
rambles  to  a  simple  meal,  partaken  of  in  comparative 
silence ;  and  now  and  then,  at  meeting  or  parting,  some 
pious  and  earnest  words  from  the  good  soul  to  her  son.' j- 
And  it  never  occurred  to  Carlyle  to  act  differently  with 
his  wife,  who  was  pining  for  his  society.  In  addition 

*  Larkin's  '  Carlyle  and  the  Open  Secret  of  his  Life,'  pp.  334-5. 
t  'Life  of  Jane  Welsh  Carlyle,'  pp.  191-2. 


126  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

to  all  that,  we  have  Froude's  brief  but  accurate  diag- 
nosis of  Carlyle's  character.  '  If/  he  wrote,  '  matters 
went  well  with  himself,  it  never  occurred  to  him  that 
they  could  be  going  ill  with  any  one  else;  and,  on 
the  other  hand,  if  he  was  uncomfortable,  he  required 
everybody  to  be  uncomfortable  along  with  him.' 

There  was  a  strong  element  of  selfishness  in  that 
phase  of  Carlyle's  nature ;  and  throughout  his  letters 
and  journal  he  appears  wholly  wrapt  up  in  himself  and 
in  his  literary  projects,  without  even  a  passing  allusion 
to  the  courageous  woman  who  had  shared  his  lot. 
Now  and  again  we  alight  upon  a  passage  where  special 
mention  is  made  of  her  efforts,  but  these  have  all  a 
direct  or  indirect  bearing  upon  his  work,  his  plans,  his 
comforts.* 

Carlyle  never  fully  realised  what  his  wife  had  been 
to  him  until  she  was  suddenly  snatched  from  his  side. 
And  this  was  his  testimony:  *I  say  deliberately,  her 

*  After  reading  the  above  estimate  in  the  proof  sheets,  Professor 
Masson  writes  to  me  as  follows : — 

'  May  I  hint  that,  in  the  passage  about  his  character  and 
domestic  relations,  you  seem  hardly  to  do  justice  to  the  depths  of 
real  kindness  and  tenderness  in  him,  and  the  actual  couthiness  of 
his  manner  and  fireside  conversation  in  his  most  genial  hours? 
He  was  delightful  and  loveable  at  such  hours,  with  a  fund  of  the 
raciest  Scottish  humour.' 

This  is  a  side  of  Carlyle's  nature  which  would  naturally  be  hidden 
from  the  general  reader,  and  from  Mr  Froude.  It  is  easy  to 
imagine  how  Carlyle's  genial  humour,  frozen  at  its  source  in  the 
company  of  the  solemnly  pessimistic  Froude,  should  be  thawed 
by  the  presence  of  '  a  brither  Scot.' 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  127 

part  in  the  stern  battle,  and  except  myself  none  knows 
how  stern,  was  brighter  and  braver  than  my  own.'  In 
one  of  those  terrible  moments  of  self-upbraiding  the 
grief-stricken  husband  exclaims  :  *  Blind  and  deaf  that 
we  are ;  oh,  think,  if  thou  yet  love  anybody  living,  wait 
not  till  death  sweep  down  the  paltry  little  dust-clouds 
and  idle  dissonances  of  the  moment,  and  all  be  at  last 
so  mournfully  clear  and  beautiful,  when  it  is  too  late  I ' 

In  a  pamphlet  quoted  by  Mrs  Ireland  we  have 
a  pathetic  picture  of  Carlyle  in  his  lonely  old  age. 
A  Mr  Swinton,  an  American  gentleman  on  a  visit  to 
this  country,  went  to  see  the  grave  of  Mrs  Carlyle. 

In  conversation  the  grave-digger  said :  '  Mr  Carlyle 
comes  here  from  London  now  and  then  to  see  this 
grave.  He  is  a  gaunt,  shaggy,  weird  kind  of  old  man, 
looking  very  old  the  last  time  he  was  here/  '  He  is 
eighty-six  now/  said  I.  *  Ay,'  he  repeated,  eighty-six, 
and  comes  here  to  this  grave  all  the  way  from  London.' 
And  I  told  him  that  Carlyle  was  a  great  man,  the 
greatest  man  of  the  age  in  books,  and  that  his  name 
was  known  all  over  the  world;  but  he  thought  there 
were  other  great  men  lying  near  at  hand,  though 
I  told  him  their  fame  did  not  reach  beyond  the 
graveyard,  and  brought  him  back  to  talk  of  Carlyle. 
'Mr  Carlyle  himself,'  said  the  gravedigger  softly,  'is 
to  be  brought  here  to  be  buried  with  his  wife.  Ay,  he 
comes  here  lonesome  and  alone,'  continued  the  grave- 
digger,  'when  he  visits  the  wife's  grave.  His  niece 


128  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

keeps  him  company  to  the  gate,  but  he  leaves  her 
there,  and  she  stays  there  for  him.  The  last  time  he 
was  here  I  got  a  sight  of  him,  and  he  was  bowed  down 
under  his  white  hairs,  and  he  took  his  way  up  by  that 
ruined  wall  of  the  old  cathedral,  and  round  there  and 
in  here  by  the  gateway,  and  he  tottered  up  here  to 
this  spot.'  Softly  spake  the  gravedigger,  and  paused. 
Softer  still,  in  the  broad  dialect  of  the  Lothians,  he 
proceeded  : — "  And  he  stood  here  awhile  in  the  grass, 
and  then  he  kneeled  down  and  stayed  on  his  knees  at 
the  grave ;  then  he  bent  over  and  I  saw  him  kiss  the 
ground — ay,  he  kissed  it  again  and  again,  and  he  kept 
kneeling,  and  it  was  a  long  time  before  he  rose  and 
tottered  out  of  the  cathedral,  and  wandered  through 
the  graveyard  to  the  gate,  where  his  niece  was  waiting 
for  him."  This  is  the  epitaph  composed  by  Carlyle, 
and  engraved  on  the  tombstone  of  Dr  John  Welsh  in 
the  chancel  of  Haddington  Church  : — 

'  HERE  LIKEWISE  NOW  RESTS  JANE  WELSH  CARLYLE,  SPOUSE 
OF  THOMAS  CARLYLE,  CHELSEA,  LONDON.  SHE  WAS  BORN 
AT  HADDINGTON,  I4TH  JULY  1801,  ONLY  DAUGHTER  OF  THE 
ABOVE  TOHN  WELSH,  AND  OF  GRACE  WELSH,  CAPELGILL, 
DUMFRIESSHIRE,  HIS  WIFE.  IN  HER  BRIGHT  EXISTENCE  SHE 
HAD  MORE  SORROWS  THAN  ARE  COMMON  ;  BUT  ALSO  A  SOFT 
INVINCIBILITY,  A  CLEARNESS  OF  DISCERNMENT,  AND  A  NOBLE 
LOYALTY  OF  HEART  WHICH  ARE  RARE.  FOR  FORTY  YEARS 
SHE  WAS  THE  TRUE  AND  EVER-LOVING  HELPMATE  OF  HER 
HUSBAND,  AND,  BY  ACT  AND  WORD,  UNWEARIEDLY  FORWARDED 
HIM  AS  NONE  ELSE  COULD,  IN  ALL  OF  WORTHY  THAT  HE  DID 
OR  ATTEMPTED.  SHE  DIED  AT  LONDON,  2 1ST  APRIL  1 866, 
SUDDENLY  SNATCHED  AWAY  FROM  HIM,  AND  THE  LIGHT  OF 
HIS  LIFE  AS  IF  GONE  OUT.' 


CHAPTER  VII 

LAST  YEARS  AND  DEATH  OF  CARLYLE 

IN  presence  of  the  pathetically  tragic  spectacle  of 
Carlyle  in  his  old  age,  who  can  have  the  heart  to  enter 
into  his  domestic  life  and  weigh  with  pedantic  scales 
the  old  man's  blameworthiness  ?  Carlyle  survived  his 
wife  fifteen  years.  His  brother  John,  himself  a  widower, 
was  anxious  that  they  should  live  together,  but  it  was 
otherwise  arranged.  John  returned  to  Scotland,  and 
Carlyle  remained  alone  in  Cheyne  Row.  He  was 
prevailed  on  to  visit  Ripple  Court,  near  Walmer,  and 
on  his  return  to  London  he  wrote,  '  My  home  is  very 
gaunt  and  lonesome ;  but  such  is  my  allotment  hence- 
forth in  this  world.  I  have  taken  loyally  to  my  vacant 
circumstances,  and  will  try  to  do  my  best  with  them.' 

Carlyle's  first  public  appearance  after  his  sore  bereave- 
ment was  as  chairman  of  the  Eyre  Committee  as  a  pro- 
test against  Governor  Eyre's  recall.  '  Poor  Eyre  ! '  he 
wrote  to  a  correspondent,  '  I  am  heartily  sorry  for  him, 
and  for  the  English  nation,  which  makes  such  a  dismal 
fool  of  itself.  Eyre,  it  seems,  has  fallen  suddenly  from 
;£6ooo  a  year  into  almost  zero,  and  has  a  large  family 

I  I  I89 


1 30  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

and  needy  kindred  dependent  on  him.  Such  his  reward 
for  saving  the  West  Indies,  and  hanging  one  incendiary 
mulatto,  well  worth  the  gallows,  if  I  can  judge/ 

Carlyle  accepted  a  pressing  invitation  to  stay  with 
the  Ashburtons  at  Mentone,  and  on  the  22nd  of 
December  he  started  thither  with  Professor  Tyndall. 
He  was  greatly  benefited  in  health,  and  at  intervals 
made  some  progress  with  his  Reminiscences.  He  re- 
turned to  London  in  March,  and  on  the  4th  of  April 
1867  he  writes  in  his  journal :  '  Idle  !  Idle  !  My  em- 
ployments mere  trifles  of  business,  and  that  of  dwelling 
on  the  days  that  culminated  on  the  2ist  of  last  year.' 
About  this  time  his  thoughts  were  directed  to  the 
estate  of  Craigenputtock,  of  which  he  became  absolute 
owner  at  his  wife's  death.  All  her  relations  on  the 
father's  side  were  dead,  and  as  Carlyle  thought  that  it 
ought  not  to  lapse  to  his  own  family,  he  determined  to 
leave  it  to  the  University  of  Edinburgh,  '  the  rents  of 
it  to  be  laid  out  in  supporting  poor  and  meritorious 
students  there,  under  the  title  of  "the  John  Welsh 
Bursaries."  Her  name  he  could  not  give,  because  she 
had  taken  his  own.  Therefore  he  gave  her  father's.' 

On  June  22nd,  he  writes  in  his  journal:  'Finished 
off  on  Thursday  last,  at  three  p.m.  2oth  of  June,  my 
poor  bequest  of  Craigenputtock  to  Edinburgh  University 
for  bursaries.  All  quite  ready  there,  Forster  and 
Froude  as  witnesses ;  the  good  Professor  Masson,  who 
had  taken  endless  pains,  alike  friendly  and  wise,  being 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  131 

at  the  very  last  objected  to  in  the  character  of  "  wit- 
ness," as  "a  party  interested,"  said  the  Edinburgh 
lawyer.  I  a  little  regretted  this  circumstance;  so  I 
think  did  Masson  secretly.  He  read  MS  the  deed  with 
sonorous  emphasis,  bringing  every  word  and  note  of  it 
home  to  us.  Then  I  signed ;  then  they  two — Masson 
witnessing  only  with  his  eyes  and  mind.  I  was  deeply 
moved,  as  I  well  might  be,  but  held  my  peace  and 
shed  no  tears.  Tears  I  think  I  have  done  with; 
never,  except  for  moments  together,  have  I  wept  for 
that  catastrophe  of  April  21,  to  which  whole  days  of 
weeping  would  have  been  in  other  times  a  blessed 
relief.  .  .  .  This  is  my  poor  "Sweetheart  Abbey," 
"Cor  Dulce,"  or  New  Abbey,  a  sacred  casket  and 
tomb  for  the  sweetest  "  heart "  which,  in  this  bad,  bitter 
world,  was  all  my  own.  Darling,  darling  !  and  in  a 
little  while  we  shall  both  be  at  rest,  and  the  Great  God 
will  have  done  with  us  what  was  His  will.'  * 

When  the  Tories  were  preparing  to  'dish  the 
Whigs '  over  the  Reform  Bill,  Carlyle  felt  impelled  to 
write  a  pamphlet,  which  he  called  Shooting  Niagara, 
and  After.  It  was  his  final  utterance  on  British 
politics.  Proof  sheets  and  revisions  for  new  editions  of 
his  works  engrossed  his  attention  for  some  time.  He 
went  annually  to  Scotland,  and  devoted  a  great  deal  of 
time  on  his  return  to  Chelsea  to  the  sorting  and 
annotating  of  his  wife's  letters. 

*  Froude's  '  Life  in  London,'  vol.  ii.  p.  346. 


1 32  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

Early  in  1869  the  Queen  expressed  a  wish,  through 
Dean  Stanley,  to  become  personally  acquainted  with 
Carlyle.  The  meeting  took  place  at  Westminster 
Deanery  :  '  The  Queen/  Carlyle  said,  *  was  really  very 
gracious  and  pretty  in  her  demeanour  throughout ;  rose 
greatly  in  my  esteem  by  everything  that  happened ;  did 
not  fall  in  any  point.  The  interview  was  quietly  very 
mournful  to  me ;  the  one  point  of  real  interest,  a 
sombre  thought :  "  Alas !  how  would  it  have  cheered 
her,  bright  soul,  for  my  sake,  had  she  been 
there!"1 

When  Carlyle  was  in  constant  expectation  of  his  end, 
he — in  June  1871 — brought  to  Mr  Froude's  house  a 
large  parcel  of  papers.  '  He  put  it  in  my  hands,'  says 
Froude.  '  He  told  me  to  take  it  simply  and  absolutely 
as  my  own,  without  reference  to  any  other  person  or 
persons,  and  to  do  with  it  as  I  pleased  after  he  was 
gone.  He  explained,  when  he  saw  me  surprised,  that 
it  was  an  account  of  his  wife's  history,  that  it  was 
incomplete,  that  he  could  himself  form  no  opinion 
whether  it  ought  to  be  published  or  not,  that  he  could 
do  no  more  to  it,  and  must  pass  it  over  to  me.  He 
wished  never  to  hear  of  it  again.  I  must  judge.  I 
must  publish  it,  the  whole,  or  part — or  else  destroy  it 
all,  if  I  thought  that  this  would  be  the  wiser  thing  to 
do.'* 

Three  years  later  Carlyle  sent  to  Froude  his  own 
*  Froude's  '  Life  in  London,'  vol.  ii.  pp.  408-9. 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  133 

and  his  wife's  private  papers,  journals,  correspondence, 
reminiscences,  and  other  documents.  '  Take  them,'  he 
said  to  Froude,  '  and  do  what  you  can  with  them.  All 
I  can  say  to  you  is,  Burn  freely.  If  you  have  any 
affection  for  me,  the  more  you  burn  the  better.'  Mr 
Froude  burnt  nothing,  and  it  was  well,  he  says,  that  he 
did  not,  for  a  year  before  his  death  he  desired  him, 
when  he  had  done  with  the  MSS.,  to  give  them  to  his 
niece.  '  The  new  task  which  had  been  laid  upon  me,' 
writes  Froude  in  his  biography  of  Carlyle,  '  complicated 
the  problem  of  the  "  Letters  and  Memorials."  My 
first  hope  was,  that,  in  the  absence  of  further  definite 
instructions  from  himself,  I  might  interweave  parts  of 
Mrs  Carlyle's  letters  with  his  own  correspondence  in 
an  ordinary  narrative,  passing  lightly  over  the  rest,  and 
touching  the  dangerous  places  only  so  far  as  was 
unavoidable.  In  this  view  I  wrote  at  leisure  the 
greatest  part  of  "  the  first  forty  years  "  of  his  life.  The 
evasion  of  the  difficulty  was  perhaps  cowardly,  but  it 
was  not  unnatural.  I  was  forced  back,  however,  into 
the  straighter  and  better  course.'  The  outcome  of  it 
all  is  too  well-known  to  call  for  recapitulation  here. 

In  February  1874,  the  Emperor  of  Germany  con- 
ferred upon  Carlyle  the  Order  of  Merit  which  the 
great  Frederick  had  himself  founded.  He  could  not 
refuse  it,  but  he  remarked,  '  Were  it  ever  so  well  meant, 
it  can  be  of  no  value  to  me  whatever.  Do  thee  neither 
ill  na  gude.'  Ten  months  later,  Mr  Disraeli,  then 


134  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

Premier,  offered  him  the  Grand  Cross  of  the  Bath 
along  with  a  pension.  Carlyle  gracefully  declined 
both. 

Upon  his  8oth  birthday,  Carlyle  was  presented  with 
a  gold  medal  from  Scottish  friends  and  admirers,  and 
with  a  letter  from  Prince  Bismarck,  both  of  which  he 
valued  highly.  His  last  public  act  was  to  write  a  letter 
of  three  or  four  lines  to  the  Times,  which  he  explains  to 
his  brother  in  this  fashion  :  '  After  much  urgency  and 
with  a  dead-lift  effort,  I  have  this  day  [5th  May  1877] 
got  issued  through  the  Times  a  small  indispensable  de- 
liverance on  the  Turk  and  Dizzy  question.  Dizzy, 
it  appears,  to  the  horror  of  those  who  have  any  interest 
in  him  and  his  proceedings,  has  decided  to  have  a  new 
war  for  the  Turk  against  all  mankind ;  and  this  letter 
hopes  to  drive  a  nail  through  his  mad  and  maddest 
speculations  on  that  side.1 

Froude  tells  us  that  Carlyle  continued  to  read  the 
Bible,  '  the  significance  of  which '  he  found  '  deep  and 
wonderful  almost  as  much  as  it  ever  used  to  be.'  The 
Bible  and  Shakespeare  remained  '  the  best  books '  to 
him  that  were  ever  written. 

The  death  of  his  brother  John  was  a  severe  shock 
to  Carlyle,  for  they  were  deeply  attached  to  each 
other.  When  he  bequeathed  Craigenputtock  to  the 
University  of  Edinburgh,  John  Carlyle  settled  a 
handsome  sum  for  medical  bursaries  there,  to  encourage 
poor  students.  *  These  two  brothers,'  Froude  remarks, 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  135 

c  born  in  a  peasant's  home  in  Annandale,  owing  little 
themselves  to  an  Alma  Mater  which  had  missed 
discovering  their  merits,  were  doing  for  Scotland's 
chief  University  what  Scotland's  peers  and  merchants, 
with  their  palaces  and  deer  forests  and  social  splendour, 
had,  for  some  cause,  too  imperfectly  supplied.' 

In  the  autumn  of  1880,  Carlyle  became  very  infirm  ; 
in  January  he  was  visibly  sinking ;  and  on  the  5th  of 
February  1881,  he  passed  away  in  his  eighty-fifth  year. 
In  accordance  with  his  expressed  wishes,  they  buried 
him  in  the  old  kirkyard  of  Ecclefechan  with  his  own 
people. 

At  his  death  Carlyle's  fame  was  at  its  zenith.  A 
revulsion  of  feeling  was  caused  by  the  publication  of 
Froude's  Life  of  Carlyle  and  the  Reminiscences.  In 
regard  to  the  former,  great  dissatisfaction  was  created 
by  the  somewhat  unflattering  portrait  painted  by 
Froude.  Was  Froude  justified  in  presenting  to  the 
public  Carlyle  in  all  grim  realism?  The  answer  to 
this  depends  upon  one's  notions  of  literary  ethics.  The 
view  of  the  average  biographer  is  that  he  must  suppress 
faults  and  give  prominence  to  virtues.  The  result  is 
that  the  majority  of  biographies  are  simply  expanded 
funeral  sermons ;  instead  of  a  life-like  portrait  we  have 
a  glorified  mummy.  Boswell's  Johnson  stands  at  the 
head  of  biographies;  but,  if  Bos  well  had  followed  the  con- 
ventional method,  his  book  would  long  since  have  passed 
into  obscurity.  It  is  open  to  dispute  whether  Froude 


136  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

has  not  overdone  the  sombre  elements  in  Carlyle's  life. 
Readers  of  Professor  Masson's  little  book,  which  shows 
Carlyle  in  a  more  genially  human  mood,  have  good 
reason  to  suspect  that  Froude  has  given  too  much 
emphasis  to  the  Rembrandtesque  element  in  Carlyle's 
life.  In  the  main,  however,  Froude's  conception  of 
biography  was  more  correct  than  that  of  his  critics. 
In  dealing  with  the  reputation  of  a  great  man  it  is  not 
enough  to  consider  the  feelings  of  contemporaries; 
regard  should  be  had  to  the  rights  of  posterity.  In 
his  usual  forcible  manner  Johnson  goes  to  the  heart 
of  this  question  when  he  says  in  the  Rambler : — '  If 
the  biographer  writes  from  personal  knowledge,  and 
makes  haste  to  gratify  the  public  curiosity,  there  is 
danger  lest  his  interest,  his  fear,  his  gratitude,  or  his 
tenderness  overpower  his  fidelity,  and  tempt  him  to 
conceal,  if  not  to  invent.  There  are  many  who  think 
it  an  act  of  piety  to  hide  the  faults  or  failings  of  their 
friends,  even  when  they  can  no  longer  suffer  by  their 
detection ;  we  therefore  see  whole  ranks  of  characters 
adorned  with  uniform  panegyric  and  not  to  be  known 
from  one  another,  but  by  extrinsic  and  casual  circum- 
stances. If  we  have  regard  to  the  memory  of  the  dead, 
there  is  yet  more  respect  to  be  paid  to  knowledge,  to 
virtue,  and  to  truth.'  When  Johnson's  own  biography 
came  to  be  written,  Boswell,  in  spite  of  the  expostu- 
lation of  friends,  resolved  to  be  guided  closely  by  the 
literary  ethics  of  his  great  hero.  In  reply  to  Hannah 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  137 

More  who  begged  that  he  would  mitigate  some  of  the 
asperities  of  Johnson,  Boswell  said,  'he  would  not 
cut  off  his  claws,  nor  make  a  tiger  a  cat,  to  please  any- 
body.' 

Some  critics  have  insinuated  that  Froude  took  a 
curious  kind  of  pleasure  in  smirching  the  idol.  The 
insinuation  is  as  unworthy  as  it  is  false.  Froude  had 
resolved  to  paint  Carlyle  as  he  was,  warts  and  all,  and 
all  that  can  be  said  is  that  in  his  anxiety  to  avoid  the 
charge  of  idealism  he  has  given  the  warts  undue 
prominence. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

CARLYLE    AS    A    SOCIAL    AND    POLITICAL    THINKER 

IN  his  essay  on  Carlyle,  Mr  John  fltoley  utters  a  protest 
against  the  habit  of  labelling  great  men  with  names. 
After  making  every  allowance  for  the  waywardness  of 
the  men  of  ^piitive  thd  poetic  insight,  it  remains  true 
that  betwe^p  the  speculative  and  the  practical  sides  of 
a  great  thinker's  mind  there  is  a  potent,  though  subtle, 
connection.  For  those  who  take  the  trouble  of  search- 
ing, there  is  discoverable  such  a  connection  between 
the  speculative  ideas  of  Carlyle  and  his  practical  out- 
look upon  civilisation.  Given  a  thinker  who  lays  stress 
upon  the  emotional  side  of  progress,  and  we  have  a 
thinker  who  will  take  for  heroes  men  of  mystical 
tendencies,  of  strong  dominating  passions,  a  thinker 
who  will  value  progress  not  by  the  increase  of  worldly 
comfort,  but  by  the  increase  in  the  number  of  magnetic, 
epoch-making  parsonalities.  Naturally,  we  hear  Carlyle 
remark  that  the  history  of  the  world  is  at  bottom  the 
history  of  its  great  men. 

Carlyle's  fanatical  adoption  of  intuitionalism  has  told 

banefully  upon  his  work  in  sociology.     Trusting  to  his 
x* 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  139 

inner  light,  to  what  we  might  call  Mystical  Quakerism, 
Carlyle  has  dispensed  with  a  rational  theory  of  progress. 
Before  a  sociological  problem,  his  attitude  is  not  that  of 
the  patient  thinker,  but  of  the  hysterical  prophet,  whose 
emotions  find  outlet  in  declamatory  denunciation.  Like 
the  prophets  of  old,  Carlyle  tends  towards  Pessimism. 
His  golden  age  is  in  the  past.  When  Past  and  Present 
appeared,  many  earnest-minded  men,  captivated  by  the 
style  and  spirit  o^phe  book,  hailed  Carlyle  as  a  social 
reformer.  As  an  attempt  to  solve  the  social  problem, 
Past  and  Present  is  not  a  success.  Carlyle  could  do 
no  more  than  tell  the  modern  to  return^b  the  spirit  of 
the  feudal  period,  when  the  people  werW  led  by  the 
aristocracy.  It  showed  considerable  audacity  on 
Carlyle's  part  to  come  to  the  interpretation  of  histo 
with  no  theory  of  progress,  no  message  to  the  w 
beyond  the  vaguely  declamatory  one  that  those  nations 
will  be  turned  into  hell  which  forget  God.  Of  what 
value  is  such  writing  as  this,  taken  from  the  introduc- 
tion to  his  Cromwell  1\ — *  Here  of  our  own  land  and 
lineage  in  English  shape  were  heroes  on  the  earth  once 
more,  who  knew  in  every  fibre  and  with  heroic  daring 
laid  to  heart  that  an  Almighty  Justice  does  verily  rule 
this  world,  that  it  is  good  to  fight  on  God's  side,  and 
bad  to  fight  on  the  Devil's  side !  The  essence  of  all 
heroism  and  veracities  that  have  been  or  will  be.1  This 
is  simply  a  reproduction  of  Jewish  theocratic  ideas ; 
indeed,  except  for  the  details,  Carlyle  might  as  readily 


1 40  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

have  written  a  life  of  Moses  as  of  Cromwell.  In 
the  eyes  of  Carlyle,  human  life  was  what  it  was  to 
Bunyan,  a  kind  of  pilgrim's  progress ;  only  in  the 
Carlylean  creed  it  is  all  battle  and  no  victory,  all 
Valley  of  Humiliation  and  no  Delectable  Mountain. 
Naturally,  where  no  stress  is  laid  upon  collective  action, 
where  individual  reason  is  depreciated,  progress  is 
associated  with  the  rise  of  abnormal  individualities, 
men  of  strong  wills  like  Cromwell  and  Frederick. 
With  Rousseau,  Carlyle  appears  to  look  upon  civilisa- 
tion as  a  disease.  In  one  of  his  essays,  Characteristics, 
he  goes  near  the  Roussean  idea  when  he  declaims 
against  self-consciousness,  and  deliberately  gives  a 
preference  to  instinct.  The  uses  of  great  men  are 
to  lead  humanity  away  from  introspection  back  to 
energetic,  rude,  instinctive  action.  When  humanity 
will  not  listen  to  the  voice  of  the  prophets,  it  must  be 
treated  to  whip  and  scorpion.  It  never  dawned  upon 
Carlyle  that  the  highest  life,  individual  and  collective, 
has  roots  in  physical  laws,  that  politico-economic  forces 
must  be  reckoned  with  before  social  harmony  can  be 
reached. 

Just  as  Carlyle's  Idealism  drove  him  into  opposition 
to  the  utilitarian  theory  of  morals,  so  it  drove  him  into 
opposition  to  the  utilitarian  theory  of  society.  Out  of 
his  idealistic  way  of  looking  upon  life  there  flowed  a 
curious  result.  As  early  as  Sartor  Resartus  we  find 
Carlyle  anticipating  the  evolutionary  conception  of 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  141 

society.  Spencer  has  familiarised  us  with  the  idea 
that  society  is  an  organism.  The  idea  which  he 
received  from  the  Germans  that  Nature  is  not  a  mere 
mechanical  collection  of  :atoms,  but  the  materialised 
expression  of  a  spiritual  unity — that  idea  Carlyle 
extended  to  society.  As  he  puts  it  in  Sartor  Re- 
sartus :  '  Yes,  truly,  if  Nature  is  one,  and  a  living 
indivisible  whole,  much  more  is  Mankind,  the  Image 
that  reflects  and  creates  Nature,  without  which  Nature 
were  not.  .  .  .  Noteworthy  also,  and  serviceable  for 
the  progress  of  this  same  individual,  wilt  thou  find  his 
subdivisions  into  Generations.  Generations  are  as  the 
Days  of  toilsome  Mankind ;  Death  and  Birth  are  the 
vesper  and  the  matin  bells,  that  summon  Mankind  to 
sleep,  and  to  rise  refreshed  for  new  advancement. 
What  the  Father  has  made,  the  Son  can  make  and 
enjoy ;  but  has  also  work  of  his  own  appointed  him. 
Thus  all  things  wax  and  roll  onwards.  .  .  .  Find  man- 
kind where  thou  wilt,  thou  findest  it  in  living  move- 
ment, in  progress  faster  or  slower;  the  Phoenix  soars 
aloft,  hovers  with  outstretched  wings,  filling  Earth  with 
her  music  ;  or  as  now,  she  sinks,  and  with  spheral 
swan-song  immolates  herself  in  flame,  that  she  may  soar 
the  higher  and  sing  the  clearer.' 

Philosophies  of  civilisation  have  a  tendency  to  beget 
Fatalism.  Bent  upon  watching  the  resistless  play  of 
general  laws,  philosophers,  in  their  admiration  of  the 
products,  are  apt  to  ignore  the  frightful  suffering  and 


142  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

waste  involved  in  the  process.  Society  being  an 
organism,  a  thing  of  development,  the  duty  of  thinkers 
is  to  demonstrate  the  nature  of  sociological  laws,  and 
allow  them  free  scope  for  operation.  To  this  is  due 
much  of  the  apparent  hardness  of  Eighteenth  Century 
political  speculation,  which,  beginning  with  the  French 
Physiocratic  School,  culminated  in  the  works  of  Adam 
Smith,  Ricardo,  Bentham,  and  the  two  Mills.  With 
those  thinkers,  the  one  palpable  lesson  of  the  past 
was  the  duty  of  abstaining  from  interference  with  the 
general  process  of  social  development.  Give  man 
liberty,  said  the  Utilitarian  Radicals,  and  he  will 
work  out  his  own  salvation  :  from  the  play  of  indi- 
vidual self-interest,  social  harmony  will  result. 

Carlyle  is  frequently  thought  of  as  a  Conservative 
force  in  politics.  In  some  respects  he  was  more 
Radical  than  the  Benthams  and  the  Mills.  His 
deeper  ideal  conception  of  society  intensified  his  dis- 
satisfaction with  society  as  it  existed.  In  fact,  to 
Carlyle's  attack  upon  those  institutions,  beliefs  and 
ceremonies  which  had  no  better  basis  than  mere 
unreasoning  authority,  most  of  the  Radicalism  of  the 
early  *  forties'  was  due.  Conceive  what  effect  lan- 
guage like  this  must  have  had  upon  thoughtful,  high- 
souled  young  men :  '  Call  ye  that  a  Society,  where 
there  is  no  longer  any  Social  Idea  extant;  not  so 
much  as  the  Idea  of  a  common  Home,  but  only  of 
a  common  overcrowded  Lodging-house  ?  Where  each, 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  143 

isolated,  regardless  of  his  neighbour,  turned  against  his 
neighbour,  clutches  what  he  can  get,  and  cries  "Mine!" 
and  calls  it  Peace  because,  in  the  cut-purse  and  cut- 
throat Scramble,  no  steel  knives,  but  only  a  far  cun- 
ninger  sort,  can  be  employed?  Where  Friendship, 
Communion,  has  become  an  incredible  tradition ;  and 
your  holiest  Sacramental  Supper  is  a  smoking  Tavern 
Dinner,  with  Cook  for  Evangelist  ?  Where  your  Priest 
has  no  tongue  but  for  plate-licking;  and  your  high 
Guides  and  Governors  cannot  guide ;  but  on  all  hands 
hear  it  passionately  proclaimed :  Laissez  faire ;  leave 
us  alone  of  your  guidance,  such  light  is  darker  than 
darkness ;  eat  your  wages  and  sleep.  Thus,  too,  must 
an  observant  eye  discern  everywhere  that  saddest  spec- 
tacle :  the  Poor  perishing,  like  neglected,  foundered 
Draught-Cattle,  of  Hunger  and1  Overwork ;  the  Rich, 
still  more  wretchedly,  of  Idleness,  Satiety,  and  Over- 
growth. The  Highest  in  rank,  at  length,  without 
honour  from  the  Lowest ;  scarcely,  with  a  little  mouth- 
honour,  as  from  tavern-waiters  who  expect  to  put  it  in 
the  bill.  Once  sacred  Symbols  fluttering  as  empty 
Pageants,  whereof  men  grudge  even  the  expense;  a 
World  becoming  dismantled :  in  one  word,  the 
CHURCH  fallen  speechless,  from  obesity  and  apo- 
plexy; the  STATE  shrunken  into  a  Police-Office, 
straitened  to  get  its  pay ! ' 

It  was  when   suggesting   a   remedy   that   Carlyle's 
Idealistic    Radicalism    parted    company    with    Utili- 


144  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

tarian  Radicalism.  Failing  to  see  that  society  was 
in  a  transition  period,  a  period  so  well  described  by 
Herbert  Spencer  as  the  movement  from  Militarism  to 
Industrialism,  in  which  there  was  a  severe  conflict  of 
ideals,  opinions,  and  interests,  Carlyle  sought  for  the 
remedy  in  a  return  to  a  form  of  society  which  had 
been  outgrown.  There  was  surely  something  patheti- 
cally absurd  in  the  spectacle  of  a  great  teacher  en- 
deavouring to  cure  social  and  political  diseases  by 
preaching  the  resuscitation  of  Puritanism  at  a  time 
when  the  intellect  of  the  day  was  parting  company 
with  theocratic  conceptions.  Equally  absurd  was  it 
to  offer  as  a  remedy  for  social  anarchy  the  despotism 
of  ambitious  rulers  at  a  time  when  society  was  suffering 
from  the  effects  of  previous  despotism.  Equally  irrele- 
vant was  the  attempt  in  Past  and  Present  to  get  re- 
formers to  model  modern  institutions  on  those  of  the 
Middle  Ages.  Carlyle's  remedy  for  the  evils  of  liberty 
was  a  return  to  the  apron-strings  of  despotism.  Carlyle, 
in  fact,  forgot  his  conception  of  society  as  a  developing 
organism;  he  endeavoured  to  arrest  progress  at  the 
autocratic  stage,  because  of  his  ignorance  of  the  laws 
of  progress  and  his  lack  of  sympathy  with  democratic 
ideas.  Still,  the  value  of  Carlyle's  political  writings 
should  not  be  overlooked.  The  Utilitarian  Radicals 
laid  themselves  open  to  the  charge  of  intellectual 
superstition.  They  worshipped  human  nature  as  a 
fetish.  Lacking  clear  views  of  social  evolution,  they 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  145 

overlooked  the  relativity  of  political  terms.  Ignorant 
of  the  conception  of  human  nature  to  which  Spencer 
has  accustomed  us,  the  old  Radicals  treated  it  as 
a  constant  quantity  which  only  needed  liberty  for  its 
proper  development.  In  their  eagerness  to  discard 
theology,  they  discarded  the  truth  of  man's  depravity 
which  finds  expression  in  the  creed  of  the  Churches. 
We  have  changed  all  that.  We  now  realise  the  fact 
that  political  institutions  are  good  or  bad,  not  as  they 
stand  or  fall  when  tested  by  the  first  principles  of  a 
rationalistic  philosophy,  but  as  they  harmonise  or  con- 
flict with  existing  phases  of  human  nature. 

If  in  the  sphere  of  industrialism  Carlyle  as  a  guide 
is  untrustworthy,  great  is  his  merit  as  an  inspirer.  His 
influence  was  needed  to  counteract  the  cold  prosaic 
narrowness  of  the  Utilitarian  teaching.  He  called 
attention  to  an  aspect  of  the  economic  question  which 
the  Utilitarian  Radicals  ignored,  namely,  the  inade- 
quacy of  self-interest  as  a  social  bond.  To  Carlyle  is 
largely  due  the  higher  ethical  conceptions  and  quick- 
ened sympathies  which  now  exist  in  the  spheres  of 
social  and  industrial  relationships.  Unhappily  his  im- 
plicit faith  in  intuitionalism  led  him  to  deride  political 
economy  and  everything  pertaining  to  man's  material 
life.  Much  there  was  in  the  writings  of  the  economists 
to  call  for  severe  criticism,  and  if  Carlyle  had  treated 
the  subject  with  discrimination  he  would  have  been  a 
power  for  good ;  but  he  chose  to  pour  the  vials  of  his 
I  K 


FAMOUS  SCOTS 


contempt  upon  political  economy  as  a  science,  and 
upon  modern  industrial  arrangements,  with  the  result 
that  many  of  the  most  intelligent  students  of  sociology 
have  been  repelled  from  his  writings.  In  this  respect 
he  contrasts  very  unfavourably  with  Mill,  who,  notwith- 
standing the  temptations  to  intellectual  arrogance  from 
his  one-sided  training,  with  quite  a  chivalrous  regard 
for  truth,  was  ever  ready  to  accept  light  and  leading 
from  thinkers  who  differed  from  him  in  temperament 
and  methods.  There  may  be  conflicting  opinions 
as  to  which  of  the  two  men  was  intellectually 
the  greater,  but  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  Mill 
dwelt  in  an  atmosphere  of  intellectual  serenity  and 
nobility  far  removed  from  the  foggy  turbulence  in 
which  Carlyle  lived,  moved,  and  had  his  being. 
Between  the  saintly  apostle  of  Progress  and  the 
barbaric  representative  of  Reaction  there  was  a  great 
gulf  fixed. 

As  was  natural,  the  Latter-day  Pamphlets  were 
treated  as  a  series  of  political  ravings.  For  that 
estimate  Carlyle  himself  was  largely  responsible.  He 
deprived  himself  of  the  sympathy  of  intelligent  readers 
by  the  violence  of  his  invective  and  the  lack  of  dis- 
crimination in  his  abuse.  Much  of  what  Carlyle  said 
is  to  be  found  in  Mill's  Representative  Government, 
said,  too,  in  a  quiet,  rational  style,  which  commands 
attention  and  respect.  Mill,  no  more  than  Carlyle, 
was  a  believer  in  mob  rule.  He  did  not  think  that 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  147 

the  highest  wisdom  was  to  be  had  by  the  counting  of 
heads.  Thinkers  like  Mill  and  Spencer  did  not  deem 
it  necessary  to  pour  contempt  on  modern  tendencies. 
They  suggested  remedies  on  the  lines  of  these  tendencies. 
They  did  not  try  to  put  back  the  hands  on  the  clock  of 
time;  they  sought  to  remove  perturbing  influences. 
Much  of  the  evil  has  arisen  from  men  trying  to  do  by 
political  methods  what  should  not  be  done  by  these 
methods.  Carlyle's  idea  that  Government  should  do 
this,  that,  and  the  other  thing  has  wrought  mischief,  in- 
asmuch as  it  has  led  to  an  undue  belief  in  the  virtues 
of  Government  interference.  His  writings  are  largely 
responsible  for  the  evils  he  predicted. 

It  is  curious  to  notice  how,  with  all  his  belief  in 
individualism,  Carlyle,  in  political  matters,  was  un- 
consciously driven  in  the  direction  of  socialism.  Get 
your  great  man,  worship  him,  and  render  him  obedience 
— such  was  the  Carlylean  recipe  for  modern  diseases. 
Suppose  the  great  man  found,  how  is  he  to  proceed  ? 
In  these  democratic  days,  he  can  only  proceed  by 
ruling  despotically  with  the  popular  consent ;  in  other 
words,  there  will  follow  a  regime  of  paternalism  and 
fraternalism,  the  practical  outcome  of  which  would  be 
Socialism.  Carlyle  himself  never  suspected  how  childish 
was  his  conception  of  national  life.  He  wrote  of  his 
Great  Man  theory  as  if  it  was  a  discovery,  whereas  the 
most  advanced  races  had  long  since  passed  through  it, 
and  those  which  were  not  advanced  were  precisely 


FAMOUS  SCOTS 


those  which  had  not  been  able  to  shake  themselves 
free  of  paternal  despotism.  On  this  point  the  criticism 
of  the  late  Professor  Minto  goes  to  the  heart  of  the 
matter  :  '  Carlyle's  doctrines  are  the  first  suggestions  of 
an  earnest  man,  adhered  to  with  unreasoning  tenacity. 
As  a  rule,  with  no  exception,  that  is  worth  naming,  they 
take  account  mainly  of  one  side  of  a  case.  He  was  too 
impatient  of  difficulties,  and  had  too  little  respect  for 
the  wisdom  and  experience  of  others  to  submit  to  be 
corrected  :  opposition  rather  confirmed  him  in  his  own 
opinion.  Most  of  his  practical  suggestions  had  already 
been  made  before,  and  judged  impracticable  upon 
grounds  which  he  could  not,  or  would  not,  understand. 
His  modes  of  dealing  with  pauperism  and  crime  were 
in  full  operation  under  the  despotism  of  Henry  VII. 
and  Henry  VIII.  His  theory  of  a  hero-king,  which 
means  in  practice  an  accidentally  good  and  able  man 
in  a  series  of  indifferent  or  bad  despots,  had  been  more 
frequently  tried  than  any  other  political  system  ;  Asia 
at  this  moment  contains  no  government  that  is  not 
despotic.  His  views  in  other  departments  of  knowledge 
are  also  chiefly  determined  by  the  strength  of  his  un- 
reasoning impulses.' 

In  his  interesting  Recollections  Mr  Espinasse  states 
that  during  the  time  that  Carlyle  was  writing  on  the 
labour  question,  not  a  single  blue-book  was  visible  on 
his  table!  To  Carlyle's  influence  must  be  traced 
much  of  the  sentimental  treatment  of  social  and  in- 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  149 

dustrial  questions  which  has  followed  the  unpopularity 
of  political  economy.  It  is  only  fair  to  Carlyle  to  note, 
that  at  times  he  had  qualms  as  to  the  superiority  of  his 
paternal  theory  of  government  over  Laissez  Faire.  In 
one  place  he  admits  that  even  Frederick  could  not 
have  superintended  the  great  emigration  movement  to 
such  good  effect  as  was  done  by  the  spontaneous  efforts 
of  nature.  In  the  social  sphere  Carlyle  was  false  to  his 
doctrine  of  spontaneity.  In  his  early  essays  he  was 
perpetually  condemning  mechanical  interference  with 
society,  and  contending  that  free  play  should  be  given  to 
the  dynamic  agencies.  Untrue  to  himself  and  his  creed, 
Carlyle  in  his  later  books  was  constantly  denounc- 
ing Government  for  neglecting  to  apply  mechanical 
remedies  for  social  diseases.  In  his  view,  the  duty  of 
a  ruler  was  not  to  work  in  harmony  with  social  im- 
pulses, but  to  cut  and  carve  institutions  in  harmony 
with  the  ideas  of  great  men.  Puritanism  under  Crom- 
well failed  because  it  was  forgotten  that  society  is  an 
organism,  not  a  piece  of  clay,  to  be  moulded  according 
to  the  notions  of  heroic  potters.  Strictly  speaking, 
Frederick  and  Cromwell  should  be  classed  with  the 
Latter  Day  Pamphlets.  In  the  Pamphlets  Carlyle  de- 
claims against  democratic  methods,  and  in  Frederick 
and  Cromwell  we  are  presented  with  incarnations  of 
autocratic  methods. 

Of  all  the  critics  of  Carlyle,  no  one  has  surpassed 
Mr  Morley  in  indicating  the  mischievous  effects  which 


150  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

flow  from  the  elevation  of  mere  will  power  and 
emotional  force  into  guides  in  social  and  political 
questions.  As  Mr  Morley  says  :  *  The  dictates  of  a 
kind  heart  are  of  superior  force  to  the  maxims  of 
political  economy ;  swift  and  peremptory  resolution  is 
a  safer  guide  than  a  balancing  judgment.  If  the  will 
works  easily  and  surely,  we  may  assume  the  rectitude 
of  the  moving  impulse.  All  this  is  no  caricature  of  a 
system  which  sets  sentiment,  sometimes  hard  senti- 
ment, above  reason  and  method.  In  other  words,  the 
writer  who  in  these  days  has  done  more  than  anybody 
else  to  fire  men's  hearts  with  a  feeling  for  right,  and  an 
eager  desire  for  social  activity,  has,  with  deliberate 
contempt,  thrust  away  from  him  the  only  instru- 
ments by  which  we  can  make  sure  what  right  is,  ! 
and  that  our  social  action  is  effective.  A  born  poet, 
only  wanting  perhaps  a  clearer  feeling  for  form  and  a 
more  delicate  spiritual  self-possession  to  have  added 
another  name  to  the  illustrious  band  of  English 
singers,  he  has  been  driven  by  the  impetuosity  of 
his  sympathies  to  attack  the  scientific  side  of  social 
questions  in  an  imaginative  and  highly  emotional 
manner.' 

Had  Carlyle  confined  himself  to  description  of 
social,  industrial,  and  political  diseases,  he  would  have 
had  an  unsullied  reputation  in  the  sphere  of  spiritual 
dynamics,  but  flaws  immediately  appeared  when  he 
endeavoured  to  prescribe  remedies.  Many  of  his 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  151 

remedies  were  too  vague  to  be  of  use ;  where  they 
were  specific,  they  were  so  Quixotic  as  to  be  useless. 
His  proposals  for  dealing  with  labour  and  pauperism 
never  imposed  on  any  sensible  man  on  this  side  of 
cloud-land. 


CHAPTER  IX 

CARLYLE   AS    AN    INSPIRATIONAL    FORCE 

IT  is  the  misfortune  of  the  critic,  the  historian,  and 
the  sociologist  to  be  superseded.  In  the  march  of 
events  the  specialist  is  fated  to  be  left  behind.  The 
influence  of  the  inspirationalist  is  ever-enduring.  As 
the  present  writer  has  elsewhere  said : — Carlyle  has 
been  called  a  prophet.  The  word  in  these  days 
has  only  a  vague  meaning.  Probably  Carlyle  earned 
the  name  in  consequence  of  the  oracular  and 
denunciatory  elements  in  his  later  writings.  Then, 
again,  the  word  prophet  has  come  to  be  associated 
with  the  thought  of  a  foreteller  of  future  events. 
A  prophet  in  the  true  sense  of  the  word  is  not  one 
who  foretells  the  future,  but  one  who  revives  and  keeps 
alive  in  the  minds  of  his  contemporaries  a  vivid  sense 
of  the  great  elemental  facts  of  life.  Why  is  it  that  the 
Bible  attracts  to  its  pages  men  of  all  kinds  of  tempera- 
ment and  all  degrees  of  culture  ?  Because  in  it, 
'  especially  in  the  Psalms,  Job,  and  the  writings  of 
Isaiah  and  his  brother  prophets,  serious  people  are 
brought  face  to  face  with  the  great  mysteries,  God, 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  153 

Nature,  Man,  Death,  etc. — mysteries,  however,  which 
only  rush  in  upon  the  soul  of  man  in  full  force  on 
special  occasions,  in  hours  of  lonely  meditation,  or  by 
the  side  of  an  open  grave.  In  the  hurly-burly  of  life 
the  sense  of  what  Carlyle  calls  the  Immensities, 
Eternities,  and  Silences,  become  so  weak  that  even 
good  men  have  sorrowfully  to  admit  that  they  live 
lives  of  practical  materialism.  As  Arnold  puts  it : 

"  Each  day  brings  its  petty  dust 

Our  soon-choked  souls  to  fill, 
And  we  forget  because  we  must, 
And  not  because  we  will." 

The  mission  of  the  Hebrew  prophet  was  by  passionate 
utterance  to  keep  alive  in  the  minds  of  his  countrymen 
a  deep,  abiding  sense  of  life's  mystery,  sacredness,  and 
solemnity.  What  Isaiah  did  for  his  day,  Carlyle  did 
for  the  moderns.  In  the  whole  range  of  modern 
literature,  it  is  impossible  to  match  Carlyle's  mag- 
nificent passages  in  Sartor  Resartus,  in  which,  under 
a  biographical  guise,  he  deals  with  the  great  primal 
emotions,  wonder,  awe,  admiration,  love,  which  form 
the  warp  and  woof  of  human  life. 

Nothing  can  be  finer  than  the  following  rebuke  to 
those  mechanical  scientists  who  imagine  that  Nature 
can  be  measured  by  tape-lines,  and  duly  labelled  in 
museums : — 

*  System  of  Nature  !  To  the  wisest  man,  wide  as  is 
his  vision,  Nature  remains  of  quite  infinite  depth,  of 


OF  THE 


154  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

quite  infinite  expansion;  and  all  Experience  thereof 
limits  itself  to  some  few  computed  centuries  and 
measured  square-miles.  The  course  of  Nature's  phases, 
on  this  our  little  fraction  of  a  Planet,  is  partially 
known  to  us;  but  who  knows  what  deeper  courses 
these  depend  on;  what  infinitely  larger  Cycle  (of 
causes)  our  little  Epicycle  revolves  on?  To  the 
Minnow  every  cranny  and  pebble,  and  quality  and 
accident,  of  its  little  native  Creek  may  have  become 
familiar :  but  does  the  Minnow  understand  the  Ocean 
Tides  and  periodic  Currents,  the  Trade-winds,  and 
Monsoons,  and  Moon's  eclipses ;  by  all  which  the 
condition  of  its  little  Creek  is  regulated,  and  may, 
from  time  (w«miraculously  enough),  be  quite  overset 
and  reversed  ?  Such  a  minnow  is  Man ;  his  Creek 
this  Planet  Earth ;  his  Ocean  the  immeasurable  All ; 
his  Monsoons  and  periodic  Currents  the  mysterious 
Course  of  Providence  through  ^Eons  of  ^Eons.  We 
speak  of  the  Volume  of  Nature :  and  truly  a  Volume 
it  is, — whose  Author  and  Writer  is  God.' 

Agree  or  disagree  with  Carlyle's  views  of  the  Ultimate 
Reality  as  we  may,  there  can  be  nothing  but  harmony 
with  the  spirit  which  breathes  in  the  following : — 

'  Nature  ?  Ha  !  Why  do  I  not  name  thee  God  ?  Art 
not  thou  the  "  Living  Garment  of  God  "  ?  O  Heavens, 
is  it  in  very  deed,  HE,  then,  that  ever  speaks  through 
thee ;  that  lives  and  loves  in  thee,  that  lives  and  loves 
in  me? 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  155 

'  Fore-shadows,  call  them  rather  fore-splendours,  of 
that  Truth,  and  Beginning  of  Truths,  fell  mysteriously 
over  my  soul.  Sweeter  than  Dayspring  to  the  Ship- 
wrecked in  Nova  Zembla ;  ah  !  like  the  mother's  voice 
to  her  little  child  that  strays  bewildered,  weeping  in 
unknown  tumults;  like  soft  streamings  of  celestial 
music  to  my  too-exasperated  heart,  came  that  Evangel. 
The  Universe  is  not  dead  and  demoniacal,  a 
charnel-house  with  spectres ;  but  godlike,  and  my 
Father's  ! ' 

The  mystery  and  fleetingness  of  life  with  its  awful 
counterpart  death,  are  the  commonplaces  of  every  hour, 
but  who  but  Carlyle  has  rendered  them  with  such 
inspirational  power  ? 

'  Generation  after  generation  takes  to  itself  the  form 
of  a  Body ;  and  forth-issuing  from  Cimmerian  Night, 
on  Heaven's  mission  APPEARS.  What  Force  and  Fire 
is  in  each  he  expends :  one  grinding  in  the  mill  of 
Industry ;  one  hunter-like  climbing  the  giddy  Alpine 
heights  of  Science ;  one  madly  dashed  to  pieces  on  the 
rocks  of  Strife,  in  war  with  his  fellow : — and  then 
the  Heaven-sent  is  recalled;  his  earthly  Vesture  falls 
away,  and  soon  even  to  sense  becomes  a  vanished 
Shadow.  Thus,  like  some  wild-flaming,  wild-thunder- 
ing train  of  Heaven's  Artillery,  does  this  mysterious 
MANKIND  thunder  and  flame,  in  long-drawn,  quick- 
succeeding  grandeur,  through  the  unknown  Deep. 
Thus,  like  a  God-created,  fire-breathing  Spirit-host,  we 


156  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

emerge  from  the  Inane ;  haste  stormfully  across  the 
astonished  Earth ;  then  plunge  again  into  the  Inane. 
Earth's  mountains  are  levelled,  and  her  seas  filled  up, 
in  our  passage ;  can  the  Earth,  which  is  but  dead  and 
a  vision,  resist  Spirits  which  have  reality  and  are  alive  ? 
On  the  hardest  adamant  some  footprint  of  us  is 
stamped  in  ;  the  last  Rear  of  the  host  will  read  traces 
of  the  earliest  Van.  But  whence  ? — O  Heaven, 
whither?  Sense  knows  not;  Faith  knows  not;  only 
that  it  is  through  Mystery  to  Mystery,  from  God  and 
to  God. 

0> 

« We  are  such  stuff 

As  Dreams  are  made  of,  and  our  little  Life 
Is  rounded  with  a  sleep  ? ' 

A  fervid  perception  of  the  evanescence  and  sorrows 
of  life  is  the  root  of  Carlyle's  pathos,  which  is  unsur- 
passed in  literature.  It  leads  him  to  some  beautiful 
contrasts  between  childhood  and  manhood,  positively 
idyllic  in  their  charm. 

1  Happy  season  of  Childhood ! '  exclaims  Teufels- 
drockh :  *  Kind  Nature,  that  art  to  all  a  bountiful 
mother ;  that  visitest  the  poor  man's  hut  with  auroral 
radiance ;  and  for  thy  Nurseling  hast  provided  a  soft 
swathing  of  Love  and  infinite  Hope,  wherein  he  waxes 
and  slumbers,  danced-round  (umgaukelt)  by  sweetest 
Dreams  !  If  the  paternal  Cottage  still  shuts  us  in,  its 
roof  still  screens  us;  with  a  Father  we  have  as  yet 
a  prophet,  priest  and  king,  and  an  Obedience  that 


THOMAS  CARLVLE 


makes  us  Free.  The  young  spirit  has  awakened  out 
of  Eternity,  and  knows  not  what  we  mean  by  Time  ; 
as  yet  Time  is  no  fast-hurrying  stream,  but  a  sportful 
sunlit  ocean  ;  years  to  the  child  are  as  ages  ;  ah  !  the 
secret  of  Vicissitude,  of  that  slower  or  quicker  decay 
and  ceaseless  down-rushing  of  the  universal  World- 
fabric,  from  the  granite  mountain  to  the  man  or 
day-moth,  is  yet  unknown  ;  and  in  a  motionless 
Universe,  we  taste,  what  afterwards  in  this  quick- 
whirling  Universe  is  forever  denied  us,  the  balm  of 
Rest.  Sleep  on,  thou  fair  Child,  for  thy  long  rough 
journey  is  at  hand  !  A  little  while,  and  thou  too  shalt 
sleep  no  more,  but  thy  very  dreams  shall  be  mimic 
battles  ;  thou  too,  with  old  Arnauld,  must  say  in  stern 
patience:  "Rest?  Rest?  Shall  I  not  have  all 
Eternity  to  rest  in  ?  "  Celestial  Nepenthe  !  though  a 
Pyrrhus  conquer  empires,  and  an  Alexander  sack  the 
world,  he  finds  thee  not  ;  and  thou  hast  once  fallen 
gently,  of  thy  own  accord,  on  the  eyelids,  on  the  heart 
of  every  mother's  child.  For,  as  yet,  sleep  and  waking 
are  one  :  the  fair  Life-garden  rustles  infinite  around, 
and  everywhere  is  dewy  fragrance,  and  the  budding  of 
Hope;  which  budding,  if  in  youth,  too  frostnipt,  it 
grow  to  flowers,  will  in  manhood  yield  no  fruit,  but  a 
prickly,  bitter-rinded  stone  fruit,  of  which  the  fewest 
can  find  the  kernel.1 

Carlyle's  pathos  touches  its  most  sombre  mood  when 
he  is  dwelling  upon  the  common  incidents  of  daily 


158  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

life  as  painted  on  the  background  of  Eternity.  In  his 
'  Cromwell]  he  breaks  forth  in  a  beautiful  meditation 
while  dealing  with  a  commonplace  reference  in  one  of 
the  letters  of  Cromwell : — '  Mrs  St  John  came  down  to 
breakfast  every  morning  in  that  summer  visit  of  the 
year  1638,  and  Sir  William  said  grave  grace,  and  they 
spake  polite  devout  things  to  one  another,  and  they 
are  vanished,  they  and  their  things  and  speeches, — all 
silent  like  the  echoes  of  the  old  nightingales  that  sang 
that  season,  like  the  blossoms  of  the  old  roses.  O 
Death  !  O  Time  ! ' 

Severe  comment  has  been  made  upon  Carlyle's 
attitude  towards  science.  There  was  this  excuse  for 
his  contemptuous  attitude — science  in  its  early  days 
fell  into  the  hands  of  Dryasdusts.  So  absorbed  were 
these  men  in  analysing  Nature,  that  they  missed  the 
sense  of  mystery  and  beauty  which  is  the  essence  of 
all  poetry  and  all  religion.  In  the  hands  of  the  Dryas- 
dusts, Nature  was  converted  into  a  museum  in  which 
everything  was  duly  labelled.  During  the  rnania  for 
analysis,  it  was  forgotten  that  there  is  a  great  difference 
between  the  description  and  the  explanation  of  pheno- 
mena. In  Sartor  Resartus  Carlyle  rescues  science 
from  the  grip  of  the  pedant  and  restores  it  to  the 
poet.  '  Wonder,  is  the  basis  of  Worship ;  the  reign  of 
wonder  is  perennial,  indestructible  in  Man;  only  at 
certain  stages  (as  the  present),  it  is,  for  some  short 
season,  a  reign  in  partibus  infidelium?  That  progress 


THOMAS  CARLYLE  159 

of  Science,  which  is  to  destroy  Wonder,  and  in  its 
stead  substitute  Mensuration  and  Numeration,  finds 
small  favour  with  Teufelsdrockh,  much  as  he  otherwise 
venerates  these  two  latter  processes. 

'Shall  your  Science,'  exclaims  he,  'proceed  in  the 
small  chink-lighted,  or  even  oil-lighted,  underground 
workshop  of  Logic  alone ;  and  man's  mind  become  an 
Arithmetical  Mill,  whereof  Memory  is  the  Hopper, 
and  mere  Tables  of  Sines  and  Tangents,  Codification, 
and  Treatises  of  what  you  call  Political  Economy,  are 
the  Meal?  And  what  is  that  Science,  which  the 
scientific  head  alone,  were  it  screwed  off,  and  (like  the 
Doctor's  in  the  Arabian  Tale)  set  in  a  basin  to  keep  it 
alive,  could  prosecute  without  shadow  of  a  heart, — but 
one  other  of  the  mechanical  and  menial  handicrafts, 
for  which  the  Scientific  Head  (having  a  Soul  in  it) 
is  too  noble  an  organ  ?  I  mean  that  Thought  without 
Reverence  is  barren,  perhaps  poisonous ;  at  best,  dies 
like  Cookery  with  the  day  that  called  it  forth ;  does  not 
live,  like  sowing,  in  successive  tilths  and  wider-spread- 
ing harvests,  bringing  food  and  plenteous  increase  to 
all  Time.' 

'  The  man  who  cannot  wonder,  who  does  not  habitu- 
ally wonder  (and  worship),  were  he  President  of  in- 
numerable Royal  Societies,  and  carried  the  whole 
Mkcanique  Ckleste  and  Hegefs  Philosophy,  and  the 
epitome  of  all  Laboratories  and  Observatories  with 


160  FAMOUS  SCOTS 

their  results,  in  his  single  head, — is  but  a  pair  of 
Spectacles  behind  which  there  is  no  Eye.  Let  those 
who  have  Eyes  look  through  him,  then  he  may  be 
useful.' 

In  the  sphere  of  ethics,  Carlyle's  influence  has  been 
inspirational  in  the  highest  sense.  To  a  generation 
which  had  to  choose  between  the  ethics  of  a  conven- 
tional theology  and  the  ethics  of  a  cold,  prosaic  utilita- 
rianism, Carlyle's  treatment  of  the  whole  subject  of  duty 
came  as  a  revelation.  If  in  the  sphere  of  social  rela- 
tionships he  did  not  contribute  to  the  settlement  of  the 
theoretic  side  of  complex  problems,  he  did  what  was 
equally  important  —  he  roused  earnest  minds  to  a 
sense  of  the  urgency  and  magnitude  of  the  problem, 
awakened  the  feeling  of  individual  responsibility,  and 
quickened  the  sense  of  social  duty  which  had  grown 
weak  during  the  reign  of  laissez  faire.  If  Carlyle  had 
no  final  message  for  mankind,  if  he  brought  no  gospel 
of  glad  tidings,  he  nevertheless  did  a  work  which  was 
as  important  as  it  was  pressing.  In  the  form  of  a 
modern  John  the  Baptist,  the  Chelsea  Prophet  with 
not  a  little  of  the  wilderness  atmosphere  about  him, 
preached  in  grimly  defiant  mood  to  a  pleasure-loving 
generation  the  great  doctrines  which  lie  at  the 
root  of  all  religions — the  doctrines  of  Repentance, 
Righteousness,  and  Retribution. 


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